The Bear belched and proffered Big D.
The Grasshopper popped a leg in excitement.
“You too?”

Bear in front, Grasshopper in back
popping cans and slurping
but I decline their liquid courage.

I wanna run, I want to hide.
Yet…
I wanna reach out and touch the flame.
I go there with you. It’s all I can do.

The car roars down the ribbon in the dark.
A window opens, disgorging open empties –
we don’t have 500 dollars
but we can drive 500 miles.

It was warm in the night
I was cold as a stone.

An empty seat, she isn’t here.
She’ll never be here again.

My hands are tied
My body bruised, she’s got me with
Nothing to win and
Nothing left to lose.
I can’t live…

It has been over a year
why can’t I let go?

You plant a demon seed
You raise a flower of fire.

Past tombstones we fly,
dirty knuckles breaking through the crust of the Earth.
We shoot through dogfood town,
Grasshopper heaves and his legs go still.
Bear bares teeth.

We are going down, but not to Liverpool
yet it is a whole ‘nother country.

Through the alleys of a quiet city street
You take the staircase to the first floor
Turn the key and slowly unlock the door.

Turning our backs on the rosy fingers of dawn,
Bear throws Grasshopper on a bed
and tumbles into scratchy-eyed sleep.

And through the walls you hear the city groan
Outside is America.

Insomnia
and no drawer to bury the ticking clock,
the ticking timebomb
of my bursting heart.

Sweet the sin
Bitter the taste in my mouth.

Elsewhere I’ve sought substitute sweeteners
but they leave an aftertaste.

Run from the darkness in the night
Singing ha, ah la la la de day
Ah la la la de day
Ah la la de day.

The sun parts the curtains,
yet Bear sleeps on.
Is she sleeping too?

You got to cry without weeping
Talk without speaking
Scream without raising your voice.

Why are we parted?

She is raging
She is raging
And the storm blows up in her eyes.

Did you? Would you? Could you?
Did. Done. Dead.

I’m still waiting
I’m hanging on
You’re all that’s left to hold on to.

Bear is awake, Grasshopper catatonic.

The bottle run dry.
I stand with the sons of Cain
Burned by the fire of love.

Bear and I flee to a waxen tableau
set up in the grand prairie.

Still shaking
Still in pain.

Wax women as dead as our love.

You, I’m waiting for you
You, you set my desire
I trip through your wires.

A green Grasshopper rises for the journey
to the bowl of cotton.

The sun so bright it leaves no shadows
Only scars carved into stone.

We wander aimlessly across a concrete plain.

I’ll see you again
When the stars fall from the sky.

Defeated by Big D we flee.

His head it felt heavy
As he cut across the land.

Across the line, broken cookies
scraped knuckles
bleeding dirt.

His heart he could feel
Was beating, beating
Beating, beating oh my love
Oh my love, oh my love
Oh my love.

Hot head presses cold glass.
Alone in my flailing thoughts
my listless life
my turmoil and sorrow.

In the wind I hear her laughter
In the rain I see her tears
Hear her heartbeat
I hear her heartbeat.