PROMISE

What does a man need to be a man?
So simple, so complex when you add it down,
If you haven’t a word you have nothing
My father said, before we put him in the ground.
How can you ride the crest of a wave
And never get wet?
How can you choose to take a side?
And say you never bet.

The Spanish and French played invasion games
Promised the Indian nations,
They butchered the buffalo, stole the gold
To build gasoline stations.
The natives protested, tried to resist,
The Cherokee, Sioux and Chippewa Cree,
Crazy Horse knew they were crazy
So they buried his heart at Wounded Knee.

Americans looked to the Oval Office
For a promise to end the slump,
They were dealt a heartless hand of cards,
With clubs and spades, no diamond, no trump.
Life lived with pleasure or life with pain
Hardly matters a whit,
Tongue in a molten mouth
Welcomes any spit.

Hard to play hard to get
If you’re not hard to get for a start,
That promise you made and forgot
Doesn’t matter; you have no heart.
The promise of great romance, out of control,
Going nowhere like a runaway train,
The thought is still father to the deed,
We all promise to start over again

INDIFFERENCE

To be weary of the journey before you set out
Is a cross and a curse.
Accept the gift of complete indifference,
Just another washer in your purse.
Black stirring in the trees; crows revolting,
Rising and falling of black wings,
Cold stones of hail on winter face
The ending here begins.

Time; patient builder of impregnable walls,
Diviner and destroyer of each wish,
When petulant promise no promises keeps
How tastes the hook to the fish?
All dogs are wiser than their masters,
Grateful for a handful of sun,
Piss in the valley of virtue
Just for fun.

What use an inside without the outside?
Little is lost on the well-worn path,
I wished that I was there with you
Or still here beside you sat.
How little a thing it takes
To drown in sorrows or float on joys
Thoughts are real, words only garments,
Stars make no noise.

I'm inclined to head off to the west
Small houses, thatch and Kerr's Pink,
To sketch on vacant page of the mind
To see, not to look, reflect not to think.
The echo of the sky on the flat of the bay,
No natural order corrupted by reason
Where summer and winter are bound by the fall
And Spring is a permanent season.