Fell asleep under clouds and I woke up here.
Fell asleep under clouds and I woke up here.
With a timestamp expired under looming storms.
The bleeding Spring never leaves
the rainy shores,
When I only wanna
                         live in the Autumn
of two-thousand-and-twelve--
in the days and the hours
before my guts soured.
when my hollow heart leaked down
                          shaking legs
                   into small town streets
                   and I forgot myself.

In the dregs of my doubts.
In the bouts of a cowardly man
                                unqualified
to carry your baggage
                         from the airport in Billings
to the bottom of my parents' stairs.

You stared hard that night
through the North Dakota Winter
and suburban blight.
November air
chilled my lungs and my breathing stopped.

In my Lillingtons hoodie,
I stood sad and shivering
and watched you drive away
through an assaulting army of falling snowflakes.
                            the last words
                  that you'd say to me were--
the last words that you'd say to me were

"I hope you're happy, you stupid scumbag.
No one will ever love you again."

"I hope you're happy, you ******* scumbag.
No one will ever love you again."

Fell asleep in a glass and I woke up here.
Fell asleep by myself and I woke up here.

In the space between paychecks,
walking back and forth to nowhere
in a post-wage, first world shooting gallery,
                         we make
bland backgrounds,
                                dull grey blurs
from miles of stretching, chain link work weeks
                       sore legs stride fast
                        all the same.

Think of climbing but your lead feet won't play.

Blaming long nights for stiff necks,
wax poetic. Piling losses
pin each stanza to our thin, unrav'ling sleeves
                            we'll take
our chances
                        with cheap drinks,
cheap thrills and priceless conversations
                       swelled tongues talk fast
                       all the same.

We're taught to pave the roads to our own graves.

Reached in and picked a winner
from your box of stock phrases.
Finding ways
to roll zero on 2d6.
You ******' missed
                        "**** the bed!"
I guess you're no Kenny Rogers.
Longer losing streaks familiar
to the wisdom of a betting man.

"Carpe Diem" on your calf,
laugh your way to the bank.
But put a stutter on your chuckle
'til the day they seize your wages.
If it "happens for a reason,"
fold your cards and hold your tongue in.
                           Hold your tongue and
                           clamp your teeth.

"What it is is what it is."
That's a "tautology."
They taught me that one in college,
when I took critical theory!
If you seek an explanation,
you're just critically faulting
                           on your dice rolls
                           and your debts.

Reached in and hit the bottom
of your box of stock phrases.
Finding ways
to keep afloat on empty words.
You ******' missed.
                           "Feeling blessed?"
Turns out you're no Kenny Rogers.
Longer losing streaks familiar
to the wisdom of a betting man.

These streets knew feet in days gone by,
bustling sidewalks, crowded storefronts,
laughter, light and dancers leaking
out of smoke-filled bars.
Cars would wind through intersections,
blood cells between neighborhoods.
From The Corner came The Roar.

He remembers how the Autumn sounded
                       back in '84
when Alan Trammell brought The Series home,
the arcing shot off Gibson's bat,
the rolling wave of soaring voices.
                      Old English
                             "D"
              tattooed on the hearts
                        of a city
     who's been hurting since the 50's.

Bless You Boys.
Ya did it--
went and Sparked up Michigan
and lit a dimming town again
in Corktown's widening eyes.

In 20 years, though, losses pile up.
55 and starved for signs
of trends reversing, luck upending,
impending relief or just some kind of
                  something.

Sickening, cloying rapid decay
       as neighborhoods die.
These streets know crumbling cinderblock
walls and blistered paint coats don't
cover ribcages starting to show--
steel girder bones--and windows blown
out, like teeth lost from a well-spoken mouth,
allow the Lake Michigan wind to howl
                      out the tale--
            through oxidized bones--
       of just what it looks like
      when economic war hits home.

Heartbeats still find footing
in Motor City streets, beneath
         the Old English "D,"
but mind the scoreboard smart;
the Tigers lost a hundred games
                    in 2003.

You say you spent two years sleep-
walking all around here,
past convenience stores and dead ends.
Steering blind while the suburbs blurred,
your sneering eyes grew tired
like my slurring verbage

                                           Now with our words just circling 'round
                                           we'll shout right into the drain
                                           blaming newer faults on old targets...
                                            
         ­                                               And I can only say...

That you won't see me
playing Kings & Creeps
when the whiskey's gone
and this here card game's out of reach.
When the fingers point, it's nothing doing,
stated bluntly.
We're saying nothing again.

Now I've been eating crow with
a side of consternation
through a swelling, allergic throat.
Choking down all my dumbest thoughts.
My token frown flips up
when your smile turns caustic.

                                             And with the tension boiling down,
                                             bubbling up from our heads,
                                             we'll pour it out on old targets...

                                             It seems we've spilled again...

But you don't hear me
crying, "Kings & Creeps"
when the music dies
and we stand, staring at our feet.
With an unhinged jaw, even a snake can
swallow some things--
digest them back in the den.

We're saying nothing again.

Slack-jawed, wide-eyed
          tongue-tied
          and terrified
of what went left unsaid,
                I froze,
a feature of the static night.
From Summer's boiling tension
to December's weary ice
                               we'd drive
                        and count the times
             we thought we'd finally got it right.
But then
          the weight of discount decades
wrapped our chests in dynamite--
              criss-crossed trunks,
        and slant-grinned garlands
      blowing up the Christmas Tree.
Apologize later for ******* up the party;
     we were gone already anyway
with frigid wind flaying fingertips and ears.
                   Back to the car.
                  One more drive.
       One more night to half believe
           we'll get it right this time.
But what's so new about a New Year?
Still can't swallow all this scary size.
Guess we'll always be here, shrugging
            Slack-jawed, wide-eyed,
                      tongue-tied
                    ­ and terrified.