We are travelers all our lives.
Like the sun and moon, never come to rest.
When the body stops, the motion survives.

Time twists inside me.  I buried two wives,
their love spent on an endless road.  My quest  
consumed them, traveling all their lives.

Profligate summer mocks my waning drives.
Riddles of the road languish here, unguessed,
where my body stops. The motion survives

In my art’s vigor, you say, derives
force from what now seems the bitter  jest
that we are travelers all our lives.

My friend, before the end arrives
There must be time to seek again the west
beyond the sunset, where motion survives

in the dying sun, blazing, as it revives  
inhuman tongues that said it best
that we are travelers all our lives.
When the body stops, the motion survives.

We don’t belong here
Among people who see
Only red in the kaleidoscope.

People who will burn down the candy store
To keep a foreigner’s kid
From maybe getting a lollypop.

People whose good will
Ends at the top of
A concealed leather holster.

We don’t belong here
In a place where the scenery
Goes off limits 97 days a year.

A place where the wind
Is often angrier than me
And covers things with talcum powder dust.

A place where no humidity
Parches eyes and nose and mouth
And water gives you kidney stones.

A place where those with shrunken purses
Huddle down in freon igloos
Longing for the place they left.

We don’t belong here
The shadows of our spirits do not match
We sing our songs in foreign keys.

We hide the face of who we are
And wear the mask of fitting in
No, we really don’t belong here

But here we stay because
There is no other place to go.
          ljm

Most of what we ain't got
Is mostly what we need
And with that thought like it or not
I wish they'd leave me be

I've had enough to the point of giving up
Since this all went down
Common sense ain't common since
Common sense left town

It's like a day spent in the rain
Without galoshes on
And the puddles you make along the way
Follow you back home

With no thought at all in the slip and fall
And on your way down
You think common sense ain't common since
Common Sense threw in the towel

You thought it would sound real good
But there's an echo in your head
Was it in what you thought
Or was it in what they said

We're in too deep, wait for the beep
Try not to lose count
Common sense ain't common since
All of this went down