Lead a Horse Away

There it was: the canyon I’d imagined all this time,

its walls rising to hush me while my echoes hung like chimes.

The shadows of the chaparral -- impossible in size

as they free-soloed striations to engulf the blistering light.

I knew that you'd be waiting, though you'd never be my bride.

I touched my hip, my holster. My flask was there, alright.

I stole a slaking sip as I surveyed the countryside.

Where exactly, now, to seek you and to rest my leathered hide?

It must have been, now, twenty years since I’d last rode this dirt.

It recognized my boot heel, which left no stone unhurt.

I wondered if the demons I’d dispatched had recomposed,

and was it wind or their invisible teeth gnashing at my clothes?

I knew that I was bleeding, that my guts were twisted up,

but I hoped you would receive me and allow a healing sup.

No one else could press wild licorice into such a salving paste,

nor bring sweetness to ephedra by imbuing her own taste.

Well, if you wish a man to suffer, only leave him on his own --

to his vices and devices, to his desperate undertones.

He will pull toward you forever, never knowing where to go,

every ache another bindle bobbing off his broken bones.

There is nothing he’ll be prouder of than languishing for love

and becoming something heavier than he can rise above. 

Is it mercy to tableau with my mirages on the trail? 

That men are stronger than their senses is a fetid fairytale. 

We are weak by nature, hideous to behold or be held by. 

We say we're turning leaves over, but we know we don’t try.

But if all of my worst instincts are what led me to this place, 

who am I to deny destiny, albeit equally shitfaced? 

Who am I to echo in your canyon, "Hello, hello, hello,"

when it takes you so few words to tell me, "Go?"

Who am I to echo in your canyon, "Hello, hello, hello," 

when it takes you so few words to tell me, "Go?" 

Who am I to echo in your canyon, "Hello, hello, hello," 

when it takes you so few words to tell me, "Go?"

Who am I to echo in your canyon, "Hello, hello, hello," 

when it takes you so few words to tell me, "Go?"