Ponca City Girl

Ponca City Girl

She, a blue-eyed Jewish girl from Ponca City,
Came to Ft. Worth trying out for the symphony.
Talent she had in cords, fingers small and strong.
Shy and bold she left her daddy's store
And the weary comfort of her mother's embrace.

Only cowboys stayed in that wind blown place.
Boys with any git up went to Tulsa or Dallas.
The only Jewish boy she knew lived in Quahna
with his dreams of Israel and secret violence.
Faced with dreams and doin' she chose the violin.

I represented all she was running from, yet
She knew me from across the room and smiled at
My jeans and boots as I tried to find a place
For the big bull fiddle (my shelter)and my hat,
Nervous as a colt comforted by her smiling face.

She smelled of the little store's camphor and
Flowery perfume. The blue of her eyes almost hid
The scratches on her old contact lenses, but beneath
The loose cotton blouse she was round and lean
Yearning to be rode hard and forced to win.

She played all the parts. Her heart in every note,
She ached she flew she tore apart the composer's soul.
I loved her at that moment, and vowed to be the deep
And driving rhythm that marked her passage and keep
Her reaching for the boys she was not allowed to know.

To her I was leather and oil and horses and hay
Didn't matter that I knew Mahler and Vivaldi
The smell of stables can never be washed away--
What she knew and would not have. Only penetration
Nothing more, begging to have her virgin heart torn.

The passion that drove us deep then ripped us apart
Was the prairie tornado that knocked Ponca City flat.
The power of our undoing flung us like precious
Pictures exploding from a trailer park beneath
Earth's swirling dance of power and indifference.

Later on she earned the first chair in Houston.
While I was the thump in a twin fiddle band
Where the electric bass is a drum with no sky,
But the money was steady. Once I saw her again,
A concerto for violin and cello she was playin'
On a little riser at a fancy show of Arabians.

She had become Rachael's daughter as she feared,
Full in her womanhood ample in her girth
All the right notes poured from her fingers,
But no longer could music reveal her tears.
I caught her eye hoping she'd remember Ft Worth.
If she recognized me, not a trace betrayed her.