Feeding the Savage Heart

Rainy days won’t do it,
neither will good tunes
or home-ground coffee.

Duchendorf said
sunshine did it but
not for me.
Pat got close with
a little hill country,
a little back roads driving
a little of that ol’ top down,
but not quite there.

Wind across tall grass with
a north Texas skyline and
no other sound but birds
comes very close.

Mountains, per M’s definition;
those with snow year ‘round,
those’ll almost do it.

What all of these lack is M:
Without her, they’re just
vignettes; with her, any place
is the right place.

Gaberlunzie

I’ve a solution to
influence peddling
in D.C.

The problem
is perspective;
we see it as a thing
to be changed,
but its na’ –
It’s a fookin’ addiction...

A wise society accepts
supply an’ demand.

Tax the shit outta ‘em;
make ‘em all Gaberlunzies,
with exorbitant annual fees
to peddle their beads.

Prune the ranks
of the strolling bastards
an’ swell the coffers
in one fell swoop.

Chasing Bird

Born in in Charleston, his
pop started him on drums at 8,
practicing until his fingers bled
then told him he sucked.

Ronnie Free, but not that style;
he swung with Mose, rhythm
tinged with BBQ and R & B.

By the mid ‘50’s in NYC he was
a cat as cool as menthol smoke,
hangin’ and crashin’ at Hall’s loft
he played with them all;
Mose and Lester, Oscar and
Sonny, Charlie, Woody,
Marian and Dizzie.

One night he was a gone daddy;
hooked on horse, he ended up
in Bellevue just like his hero, Bird.

Cleaned up, he went home
didn’t play no more.
But the bell rang again in
the 80’s and he reappeared,
playing magic like he’d never quit.

Of those years, he said
“It was quite a ride;
I wouldn’t trade it for the world,
but I sure wouldn’t want
to do it again.”