Destination

Hello, stranger You remind me of someone A jangling lust pouncing on a sliver of a dusty pool of light Your fire’s hue is a maraschino cherry A room-temperature eye backlit by the bar Your tongue, a chewed straw You’re all period blood and soundcheck blues Both armpits ripped and a lucky horseshoe pinball bruise You’re not quite in proportion So you’ve stayed in motion Ever since your longing outgrew you Stepping and re-stepping until it is a run Over and over on the same platform from where you begun Like someday this one-horse town will pull itself out of the station Just to follow you around You’re the real destination On a boomerang counter, you crash the keys “Coffee, please” A word of advice from here in the daylight: Stay off the high road, it’s a sneering code It’s lazy border boundary to “I don’t wanna know” And we never will Trash like us, we can’t even spell But we’re impossible to kill We just self-destruct Closing time never comes Closing time never comes You love boys and guitars and girls and trucks The way you move fills me with envy and wonder You somehow live free of men’s eyes Even with a bell on your collar, they don’t find or define you You slip that noose in an arc so whip-sleek and steady You fill me with envy and wonder already Somewhere between saying and screaming, you chime “Oh I, I’m gonna live a real life With blood and dirt and the subway for dessert 'Cause there’s a feeling I’ve never met And if it’s gonna eat me alive or use me for its fuse I might as well walk it home in time for tomorrow I might as well walk it home in time for tomorrow” Most of all I love you because you don’t pretend it doesn’t hurt Waiting for the world to catch up and see you for your worth As more than just a neutral tarp to compliment the gleam Of some glossy martyr’s meat As a contrast high, a graphic feast Your compact in the gutter mingling with the slurry Of cigarettes and needles As more than a housewife, a has-been, or just somebody’s lover A housewife, a has-been, or just somebody’s lover A housewife, a has-been, or just somebody’s lover Closing time never comes Closing time never comes Oh I, I wanna live a real life With blood and dirt and the subway for dessert and more So let’s tattoo the morning paper to their driveways in our gore There’s a feeling that I have never met And if it eats us alive, we can still be on time for tomorrow