To San Antone in ’77

We jackknifed our way through the 70s,

all denim hugged, the smell of pot sticking to us like tape,

Electric dreams of electric guitars & drums

& satin and corduroy

& we rocked & swayed & nodded,

certain in our youth

that the music would never end.

We would never end.

We chugged from a common bottle of grape M.D

and marched to convention centers,

municipal auditoriums,

arenas,

coliseums,

where Muddy slid onto stage

like a great black snake and

captured us skinny kids in his E chord.

And Gibbons Tube Snaked,

and Angus Bad Boy Boogied

and we couldn’t get enough.

We wrote each other’s names on brown bagged books

and carved deep into table tops with dried out pens,

we rated one another as FOX or FINE

and passed hot boxed cigarettes between classes & murmured about:

Who fucked who

Who had weed

Who wore Levis

Who got busted

Who got pregnant

Who broke up

Who had Moxy.

We squirmed through thin bedroom windows

into the cricket chirped damp midnights

and got high in a church parking lot.

That night the cops showed up

& made Julie stand in front of the headlights of the patrol car

like a spotlight shining on stage

searching for a bag stuffed down tight pants.

Then ordered, “Get out of here!”

So we ran through the streets to the playground &

took turns on the swings trying to touch

the stars.

I let go in midair & sliced

through the darkness like a switchblade.

And we laughed & sang & drank

and crept back though windows,

like the drunk clumsy kids we were,

damp from early morning dew,

as the ink sky turned to salmon.

Today I woke and found that 40 yrs have passed.

The denim is tattered and I smell of Ben Gay & broken promises

& dead lavender.

The veins show through my tissue skin

and the world is quiet in a loud way.

The swings are frozen,

the cops are dead,

pot costs too much,

and the guitars are buzzing with feedback.

I slept like Rip Van Winkle

and woke to me

behind another face.

I cut the air with razor precision

trying to slice into a time door

but Muddy is gone,

the stages are silent,

and the M.D has been vomited out

behind garbage dumpsters.

And the smell of weed &

angst & heartbreak & longing & bravado

no longer clings to my fingertips.

I pet the dog, take my nightly pills

and wish like hell

I could still squeeze through that window

and run into the damp slick night

while the heavy dew clogs my lungs