Medicine Ball (2024)

---

I dreamed I got lost in Gloucester 

And fell in the sea

The seagulls all screamed “Impostor!” 

And pointed at me

So I sank through the turvy water

past the sharks and the seals

I stole a kiss from the gorgon’s daughter 

And soldered fists to my heels

Drown me in a butt of Malmsey wine

Crown or kin, I can’t make up my mind

I like the hunts and the balls and banquets

I like the sport and the game

But bloody burgundy’s not my color

And Patience isn’t my name

I’ve been pretending for faith and fury

I got a little too smart

Executive function has hung my jury

And run a rood through my heart

Drown me in a butt of Malmsey wine

Frown and spin the wheel to crush my spine

I’m the answer to that riddle that you rode

I won’t be littering your glittering abode

When all the deeds have been done and dusted

When every word has been said

When all the iron you wrought has rusted

I’ll still be happily dead

So many petals have fled this flower

So many hearts have gone still

Just be a lamb and unlock the tower

It’s time for one final swill  

Drown me in a butt of Malmsey wine

Gown of sin and candy alkaline

Drown me in a butt of Malmsey wine

Downy skin, you cut so deep and fine

Let’s all get something clear:

The glass that’s sitting empty is full of atmosphere

Let’s all get something clear:

That the empty air of a funereal face is full of empty atmosphere

Emptied of all that resides there in that space formerly full of beer

Let’s all get something clear

Let’s make it plain

That the empty air of a funereal face is full of pain

Let’s all get something clear:

That glass that’s sitting empty is full of atmosphere

That the air in the glass is there where last was wine

That the wine’s always trying to find and replace the pain

That the pain occupies about one half of the truth

All that we’ve lost and we can’t ever regain

Half a basket of bread, half a pile of chaff

Half a bathtub of tears, half the sound of her laugh

All the magic of a tragic love too hard for two poor hearts to maintain

All the magic of a tragic love too hard for two poor hearts to maintain

Let’s all get something clear:

The glass that’s sitting empty is full of atmosphere.

Every time you come around

(Why don’t you come around more often than you do?)

Anytime you come around

I’ll chop up my heart and liver and serve them in your stew

Every time you come around my body will be there

Any chair you rum around I’ll get down on one knee there

Every time you come around

(Why you don’t come around as often as I wish?)

Anytime you come around

Bring a plastic bag to carry home your fish

Anytime you come around I’ll stock and I’ll stow you

Anywhere you run aground I’ll tug and I’ll tow you

Every time you come around 

(Why do you thumb around so often when I’m gone?)

Any rhyme you will unwound 

Will die on my lips and limp away to darken dawn

Every time you come around you meddle and mill me

Any climb to claim your mound will fettle and fill me

I’ve been lost in the mirror

I’ve been a bug in your tea

Through the frost it’s much clearer

That you believed in me

Every time you come around

(Why don’t you come around too often anymore?)

Anytime you come around

Take down the broom and dustbin and sweep me off the floor

Every time you come around you swaddle and still me 

Every crime and crumb unbound will coddle and kill me

Heaven’s a heavy weight to bear 

On shoulders that rub around

Harder to fathom in the air 

A thousand furlongs from the ground

Castles of cups on coffee carts

Palaces wrought from pain

Nowhere to stay, no place to start

No better thing to do but rain

I never thought about the air that circulates around us

I never listened to the distance between us before

I’d rip my face right through these plains of plastic morning cloud dust

But I think I’ll close my eyes and have one more

Mayflowers wilt where maples pray

Dandelions die alone

Ploughs in my hands gang aft agley

But landing licks us to the bone

Maybe it’s not for me to learn

Secrets about your skin

What kind of wheels your pages turn

Αnd what you stick your fingers in

I never wanted you the same way that you seemed to want me

You never hurtled through my space beyond the speed of sound

And though I know you never threw the right harpoon to hunt me

My gills are filling up with blood and soon I’ll drown

I took a vow that I would do you no harm

Look at me now, about to chew off an arm

Bounce me a medicine ball

Pounce and I’ll jettison all of this cargo

I’ll break our embargo

Toss me a medicine ball

I’m sauced and I’ve gone through it all but your jeans 

Like a brick in a blender, a cat in a pinball machine

Got a dent in my fender

You know what I mean.

I took an oath that I would humor your blood

Look at us both rancid with rumor and mud  

Pass me the medicine, doll

A glass of old Jameson solves all my sorrow

I’ll swallow tomorrow

Toss me a medicine ball

I’m lost and I’ve longed for the Fall since the Spring

Like a febrile believer, the feeble withdrawal of a wing

Never meant to deceive her

You know what I mean.

Blast me with sand

Smoke in my hand

I’m getting stronger

Lungs are lasting longer

Grind up the seeds

We all have our needs

I’m neither snake nor staff

Not by half

Bounce me a medicine ball

Jounce me, I’ll jettison all of my slumber

You’ve still got my number

Toss me a medicine ball

I’m cross and I won’t take your call but you’ll see

Like a bat in a barrow, the midnight is mourning for me

Neither straight nor an arrow, you know…

Bounce me a medicine ball

An ounce of your venison’s all I can handle

Let’s blow out the candle

Pass me that medicine ball 

Molasses, my reticence crawled through this ring

I’m a stone in a pool, not a pony you pull on a string

Now they know I’m a phony

And you own everything

Bounce me a medicine ball

Denounce me, I’ll jettison all of this cargo

How far will this car go?

Toss me a medicine ball

I’ve lost and the swans have the gall just to preen

Like a wolf torn and tender, a raven so craven and keen

Think I’ll go on a bender

You know what I mean.

I’m the portrait, the parchment, the porn, the pen

You’re the bottle, the bootlegger, born again

With one foot cleft in two, dividing seas 

Where kestrels and calamities come in threes

An angel frowns and cuts the keys

I’m a worm, I’m a star that fell down from space

You’re a nightmare of whirring wings, eyes without a face

We’re the hail and the fire, dripping gore

Stripping nails at the door 

With one hand on the hearts of cats and kings

The other draping darkness on Saturn’s rings

An angel smiles and hooks its wings

Be not afraid; there is so much worse than this

With me you’ll never have to fake a kiss 

Be not afraid; there is so much thirst to come

Pray you endeavor not to leave a crumb

If you believe, babble on the edge and plunge

Bring bitter vinegar to soak your sponge

If you believe, scrabble through the hedge for me

But you might not endure the things you see

Love is α tender thing, sometimes it’s a blossom

if you want your finger bit, poke it at a possum

Love is too rough, too rude; love is primed for pricking

pierced me sore and broke its shaft, purring, finger-licking

I don’t care how good the music is, you can’t dance on every set 

You’re soaking wet

Love is a senile sea: it shifts and rants and rambles

takes its shape from the shore it meets, barleycorn and brambles

I don’t care how good the music is, she doesn’t dance to every song

Just hums along

Love is the queen of cats, a roguish mathematician

beetle brow and blushing mask betraying our condition

I don’t care how good the music is, she won’t dance until we’re done 

Go have some fun.

Firefly

Alighting on my elbow, lucky 

You and I: serenity and sweat

Eye to eye

Your cousin buzzing and no matter how I cry

You won’t let me forget about the promise that I made

To steel my mind and somehow still the blade

Firefly

Thrust tender and electric

Stars are stealing by the muddle of my mind

Porphyry sky, panselinated tendrils 

Reaching down to pry my fingers from the railing

Roll me breath by breath

And buy me luminescent time

With tokens cashed at your death

Five hundred universes learning to rhyme

Thickets thrash and burn in key lime lantern glow

Crickets psalm the lives of saints that writhe and dream the dark below

Firefly

The headlights send us reeling and my mouth is dry

You shudder on my shoulder

Don’t you blink, goodbye

Collecting falling planets but my pocket’s full of holes

Firefly

I never could have held you

Prayers have passed me by

Your finger flipped me over

Just don’t ask me why

I always seem to come back to this place again

Well, I lay my body down and I saw a dream

And then I pointed all my toenails to New Orleans

Jedidiah got his ring from the Queen, you know

And Dr. John taught Miss Laveau

So I went up to the Duke with a swampin’ fee

He lit up a cigar and he said to me:

“If you wanna see the wonders the world got on

You gotta dig that Conquerer John.”

And he said that’s hoodoo

Careful, girl, what you do

When you tryin’ to get through to reach the other side

Don’t you know that’s hoodoo

Candles black and blue, too

Cher, gris-gris de beaucoup

And I’ll be your guide.

Dr. Jenkins put a light on a wish of mine

And we sealed it with a pint of palmetto wine

A pinch of soil from a grave and we mixed it right

With sugar sweet and sulphur bright

I did the dance of Death with miss Kitty Brown

He sat upon his throne in his scarlet crown

He took me with his tongue in his teeth of hate

And Mother Kitty poured the whiskey straight

And she said that’s hoodoo…

The Frizzly Rooster ground the pepper and let me in

I touched the coral on his altar and drank his gin

He told me “If you want to learn to walk alone

You gotta get that Black Cat Bone.”

So I filled a pot with water as dark as rue

Drew a circle on the ground with an iron shoe

Tossed old Tom into the cauldron and boiled him down

And wore the midnight like a gown

And I said that’s hoodoo…

I’m so sorry I couldn’t yet be the person who died

I’m so sorry I wouldn’t let you be the first on the slide 

I’m so sorry you had to sift through those crumpled receipts

I’m so sorry that I can’t gift you these rumpled up sheets, you say

I’m so sorry I fed this troll on the sin of denial

I’m so sorry about the holes in my cinderblock smile

I’m so sorry the rot still clings to the heel of my shoe

I’m so sorry I thought to bring up that reel that we used to play

I’m so sorry I’m not your Spock and you were never my Pike

I’m so sorry we never spark despite the matches we strike

I’m so sorry I won’t lie down in the street where you sleep

I’m so sorry I stick around and trick-or-treat while you creep away 

Wake up, little sparrow

Don’t build your house in the snow

Look alive, little sparrow

Your brothers and sisters flew south

They all flew south long ago

If I were a sparrow I’d fly these doubting wings to the sea

To feel the waves wash over me and spin me away

Lift your eyes, little sparrow

To junkyards and salt springs and sweat-soaked overalls

Open wide, little sparrow

Discomfort and harm aren’t the same

They aren’t the same thing at all

If I were a sparrow I’d fly these doubting wings to the sea

To feel the waves wash over me and spin me away

Maybe I swang a little too slow

Maybe I sang too high or too low

Maybe I lost what never was mine

And maybe you tossed a velvety line

to that bird in my chest, black and blind

Maybe my eyes aren’t done with your looks

Maybe my spine is still bound to your books

Maybe it’s true that I shuffled my feet

But maybe the glue that held bones to meat

Melted morrows and all

As I recalled those first dreams about loving you

Brightly,

Through lashes and snow

And that your face is a place I’ve been dying to go

For a life and a day

So I’d like you to stay

Before we whisper farewell, faerie fey

Maybe the fun that we spent didn’t last

Maybe I’m done paying rent to the past

Maybe the blue that we sip from’s the sea

Maybe it’s you or maybe it’s me.