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goody cheap-shoes

by Gabriel Ricard

It was a labyrinth walk
in a town that looked like it had been built by drunk robots,
and my faith was not renewed
through the people I knew or met by dumb luck.

I lost money,
had bruises all over my chest,
needed a new pair of glasses
and couldn’t stop talking to myself.

My integrity hadn’t been able to keep up
with my capacity for storytelling,
and all the musicians I had met up with
the other night had checked themselves
into a quiet place in Florida for exhaustion.

They want to sit on a long, dirty front porch,
drink Long Island Iced Teas and watch two rainstorms
argue over The Bible. While a third watches and waits to pick a side.

I don’t hold anything against them.
There wasn’t a nurse, vampire, country singer
or burlesque dancer in town who was willing to return
my phone calls begging for a place to stay.

It wasn’t like I needed much.
Ten minutes of sympathy, a well-lit kitchen
and some of that tea I used to drink
when I was a kid.

My intentions would have been pure,
and I would have avoided
any and all talk of the way of the world
circa last year.

Well, actually that would depend
on who I might have been able to stay with.

Some pretty faces are worth the risk
of never making it to one of those big game shows.

Some are even worth those times
when you wake up in the trunk of your own car
and realize that you’re going to be hitting the bottom
of the volcano in about fifteen seconds.

No sense in wondering about it now.
It’s the same as when I walk down a street
that makes no bones about being a dire time
from one post office box to the other.

I know a few of these streets by the sheer volume of memories.
Others I know from people who have no choice but to head back
to them at the end of every day.

The birds are sure as hell no help.
Idiots sing the same songs and pick at the same bones
that fell out of the sky on that one offbeat day
when everyone was stupid enough to believe.

I hate every tune they throw together.
I hate everything it reminds me of.
I hate that I always have to make new old friends.

I really hate that I can steal a car
but still haven’t gotten around to learning
how to drive the damn thing.

That explains a lot
as to why I’m still here.

You’d think I’d be a better bet
and a better tour guide.

06/30/2011

Posted on 06/30/2011
Copyright © 2024 Gabriel Ricard

Member Comments on this Poem
Posted by Sarah Wolf on 07/06/11 at 02:05 AM

Love the 5th Stanza, lol

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