Passion’s Wreck

Another wink inappropriately sent across the room
As I savor the dream of the salt at the base of your neck
Though there is no way this goes ever anywhere
Adrift in the Acadien gutter of this passion wreck

Swirling skirts reel to a hot cajun beat
The Artsmophere swells with Sebastien pours
Wanna go home with me, my belle jolie?
The answer is always: mais non, tous le jours

She glories in the morning, then rules the night
But my quiver emptied long many years ago
But Love never wearies as longing grips ever tight
Though my sad offer would hardly sate a wound so

So unreconstructed in Alexandria, my tall glass half full
Dreams and wishes mingling in a nice vigne rouge
Grateful for my morning porridge and café gratuit
Let’s get to it, cross that bridge at Baton Rouge

Scream down the 10 all the way to New Orleans—
A quarantino not quite following these isolation rules
65 and dying even before comes this Chinese bugger
Not sure anyone knows, besides, they’re all tools!

Again, still half marveling at the sweat beading about your neck
Dreaming in an Acadien gutter fouled by Old Love’s passion wreck

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Ashland Train Day 2019

Their wine glasses met
Their lips were sure to follow
She of undetermined glances
He an escapee from yonder hollow

A chance meeting in the Artmosphere
A renowned Cajun dance band
He asked for a dance
Later she took his hand

Up the forty-nine
A full moon recumbent
Light paused and cloud scattered
Allowances taken and full spent

A rainy morning greeting
Toast and coffee? Sure…
A drive around Alexandria
Another three hour tour

Returned to Lafayette
Keen promises to meet again
A thought: do you like trains?
Have you ever heard of Ashland?

In the Dark, in the Cold, in the Quiet and All

A simple shameless shuffle
From blonde to brunette
Until he woke up again quite alone
Realizing only now it was so too late

That you really must make a considered choice—
Decide finally who you want to take to the ball,
Or you will certainly, in the end, pass all alone
In the dark, in the cold, in the quiet and all

The music was a rapture,
Fiddle and accordion entwined,
Her unfurled skirts blossomed across the floor,
All were happy, two-stepped, wined and dined.

Next morning bags were quick conveyed,
Gone Concourse C to return to her places up North;
You slow walked to the parking garage
Not realizing the so on and the so forth:

That you really must make a considered choice—
Decide on finally who you want to take to the ball,
Or you will certainly, in the end, pass all alone
In the dark, in the cold, in the quiet and all

A road trip here and a visit there
How you acted as if you were above it all
Everyone was coupled, partying, and fun
Now he wonders why is it no one ever calls.

The best ones really are all taken.
All the smart happy ones have debarked the bus.
You thought love will always be out there;
So, why should you have to make a fuss:

That one really must make a considered choice—
Decide on finally who you want to take to the ball,
Or you will certainly, in the end, pass all alone
In the dark, in the cold, in the quiet and all

Now the eyes fail, hair thins out,
And the joints no longer so strong.
Am I really the grasshopper in the end
Who must admit he was so so wrong?

That all really must make a considered choice—
Decide on finally who you want to take to the ball,
Or we will certainly, in the end, pass all alone
In the dark, in the cold, in the quiet and all

Dark Chocolate Covered Cashews

Dark chocolate covered cashews,
But that memory of how you smiled—
Cajun two-stepping waiting for the drawbridge to repair
As our young moment passed as away the nighttime wiled

And then how we drove slow on back to NOLA
After a gig lovely in bonny old Lafayette
As a southern full Moon stole peeks out of the clouds,
But that was the best that things would ever get

Even dark chocolate covered cashews
Cannot pause the runontape in my mind
Of the passion, the loss, and the lingering rancor—
Leftovers of a certain thin, hard, sad kind

Love arrives hot quick and ends up a wreck on the coast—
The pounding memories: a waif on a beach missing her shoes;
And the only thing one could right now want the most
Is drown out the empty with dark chocolate covered cashews