I give back all your kisses*

They got you, hands on saddle horn you lost the rein.
They got you because your canteen quenched civilian curiosity.
They got you because your name is not my name, their eyes
are not your eyes. They got you and they will get you again.
This time the Clash warned you, the doctor warned you
he, she, me and even Davey Crockett warned you
but it took the juice of Agave to make you see.

They got you short sheeted, short sighted, short changed
and settling for seventy in a world of ninety-two.
They got you because when your hour hand spirals the jig is up and when the jig is up steam grates clear empty.

You lied. Feet in stirrups it was the spurs that kicked the dust. Engulfment is only one part of the hazard here.

In Oklahoma winds whipped the fires wild. I smelled your smoke all the way down Central Texas.
I thought the neighbors started early.
They got you Tuesday by the by of the turn table diamond.
They came back for you Thursday when the silo caught the action.

They got you because cable t.v. never sleeps.
Because the steeple bells run on gasoline and corn dust.
Because your mother spent seven years under the slow dry stylist waiting for the ringing to stop.

They got you because carcasses are molded into poems.
You never said you didn't fall into their hands like salt.
Salt like the slouch of Ghandi
Salt like the hills over Sodom
Salt like we pass to our eldest son
this night and every night,
every night that evaporates into a desert howl
coming for you.

...

*After James Tate's "I take back all my kisses"

...

Survivor: Poet's Choice Trigger #11