always missing deadlines

you remember your boy in his tiny clothes.

the blonde little one in his shorts and sandals.
he spent his time outside in swings and artificial suspense.
where there was nobody.

creative without concrete construction just the whimsy of
and the unfeeling of
and the absence of

and a little boy in his mind all of it
unlearned the things he learned of
and kept away from the incoming thoughts
to fool everybody

Living on in tape records

telling me of your boys,
arms and arms of them.
There was something you were good at.

Old record, old friend
listened through the dusty
and calloused Appalachia

want a story not my own
told up on the foothill
and sunlit apple morning

soundless olden
don’t believe in modern
old friend, when I see you

Hadn’t all thought about that young woman

with red hair false as aluminum Christmas
Wanted for me when she’d found no other
Looking for someone to call my mother

Rested head didn’t dare impose none
closed up our eyes all to it
made sour coffee in the morning
couldn’t think to heed no warning

made it back over that icy mountain
the multiple lights shining in dark faces
wished I’d loved you so to tell
but loved our time so short a spell

hadn’t thought at all about that young man

with all that bristle peachy bravado

in that cold must had to make my way
told me that sun be sure set to-day.