THROUGH BEAUTY AND SAD LANDS
THROUGH BEAUTY AND SAD LANDS
on the boy running with six strings and a song
her ears ring and hum
with sounds
of his voices
ringing in ears
but no ring
on her finger
or thumb
her throat is a knot
of all his hearts
breaking
ones that went missing
hearts pounding in fear
he’s a boy running
to the next song he’s making
of pain
and of romance
he wants badly
for beauty
but lands in the badlands
the sad land of letdowns
words dropped to the floor
he’s running through fields
through trails of his lost worlds
rolls on bald tires
through maps
he only knows
slips into gaps and cracks
in between roads
highway traces
of life and of death
and unmarked places
of his many selves
mirrors crack smiles
bald tires are rolling
down highways and alleys
to moons
he’s from another time
she stands waving behind
wings of her heart beating
bleeding for not meeting
his needing
she wants to be
the girl in his songs
but that girl’s a good one
a nice one
a clean one
not the one left behind
standing choking up sorries
goodbyes
galaxies fade into night
she’s no lucky strike
strike out
is more like it
bowling ball she hurtles
down gutters and crushes
blue icees and remnants
of all dreams she hits
with all her wrong notes
breaking strings of guitars
with misspoken poems
he goes somewhere else
when he strums to the sad lands
and finds happy places
where she cannot go
inside his songs
people who hurt him are
crushed
turned into dust
under bald tires rolling
threadbare but going
to places
of his weaving
where his needing
is filled
with six strings and a song
she knows where he is now
taillights bleed
iridescent
he leaves into places
mapped inside his selves
mirrors reflecting refracting
he’s shuffling landscapes
the worlds of his making
with no key to find them
or let anyone in
he’s a boy running
inside songs of her sins
inside the lost beauty
he finds
magic and hope
he carves from his pain
she thinks he’s landed
back in the sad land
but she is the bad land
and he’s the one free
he’s a boy running through worlds
of his making
worlds made of pain
and of beauty
with six strings and a song