Driving To Thom Young’s House
I heard there were no gun laws in Texas
so I rented a Taurus and drove
to Thom Young’s house,
running over prairie dogs and singing the new
Blake Shelton Christmas song.
And when I got there
I bought a rifle and some nightcrawlers
and we fished in a puddle behind the Allsup’s.
But the fish didn’t want any worms
and on the drive back
Thom said Led Zeppelin wouldn't make it today.
And I remembered the music
and how it had lived in me once
and in my dreams
I can still hear my mother sing it like
she’s hanging over my crib.
And sometimes the college radio
comes in clear from Amarillo
and Thom finds an old box of tobacco
and we smoke like kings without a throne,
flicking ash at the coyotes circling the porch.
Once upon a time betting on
whether it would be them
or us,
but we don’t play that game as much anymore.
And on cold Sunday’s after Christmas
we leave burritos outside for the dogs.
Songs For The New War
I’ve heard songs for the new war.
They chant over crank radios
like heartbeats from a Shaman’s drum.
They come out of subways on
a three-string guitar
and the words of a runaway
who still believes in his favorite band.
They live in hog squeals you can hear from
rooftops in Chicago,
trapped in perdition,
riding the currents of the universe
like a crest without a trough.
These are the songs for the new war.
I heard my first from a Rat King
who ended his sermon with, “Humans have
infinite past lives ... but animals get none.”
I heard my second in a dream where
a black moon rose over a shallow lake
and tadpoles swam circles around the reflection
like black stars in orbit.
Is this what gets lost when we die?
Does the melody cling too tight to your soul?
What if you kept in no tears
and never found a lie you didn’t tell?
Anyone who ever lived,
any martian who ever visited,
any elephant who ever buried its friend,
it’s all led to this.
And when the messenger arrives
no one will ask about
his chest full of arrows.
And no one will care about the conclusion
of free will.
The songs of the new war will fade out
before their last chords.
They won’t be hummed in the FEMA camps
or by the future Reichs.
They’ll be buried like the family dog,
mourned for an hour
then immediately replaced.