Back to the start of a Wild West show
that hires itself out to a birthday party.
With a cast of thousands and a lot more fear
than the euphoria you might expect.

Back to the basics of a very complicated matter,
yeah,
oh yeah,
but don’t worry, sweet baby,
because nothing’s going to change for a little while.

We can still be struck dumb and held for ransom
by the same old broken bridge that used to take us
out of this same old broken town and into the same old—

Yeah,
oh yeah,
you get it.

You’re an airplane full of philosophers.
All in agreement that the plane is going to crash
when puffy clouds shred the wings right off.

This isn’t an effort to work over your hard-earned feelings.
I’d never jump out of an airplane ninety feet above the ground,
with a dozen roses taped to my back if I didn’t absolutely love you.

I’m teasing.
My sense of humor doesn’t believe in mainstream medicine.

You forgive me in the time it takes for us to believe
we have every right to run those four red lights in a row.

Broadway isn’t going to wait for us,
and neither will a future that promises
to make sense of this no man’s land.

Some pairings are discussed
and then created amongst the bumper-car stars.
Some of them can’t handle
what that Tom Petty cat called “The hardest part.”

Honeymooners figure out what they’re made of
when the sun comes around to clear out the band,
and leave the lovebirds with smug, gently caffeinated silence.

That ain’t going to be us.
We will not become a couple that throws
bags of empty wine bottles at each other
the way clowns throw pies,
they wish were bags of empty wine bottles.

Old men are not going to barely make it
to their favorite local bar, sit down,
drink their fill
and write an opera about the way we lived
ten years completely out of control.

We’re not going to die in each other’s arms,
and I’m not going to drown in what I think
your eyes are really saying.

My instincts love spirits
even more than those old men.

They can rest their weary, clicking tongues a while.

I don’t want anything running off at the frozen mouth.
When I’m trying to kiss you like they do when war is over.

Nothing’s going to change for a while,
yeah,
and then it’s just going to get better.

No one gets rich on that kind of ending,
but we’ll make do with cynicism about other things.

08/26/2012

Posted on 08/27/2012
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