FAR AFIELD

Imaginary Garden With Real Toads

The rain swept through here this morning
cleaning everything but the film 
clouding your eyes

she was all smoke and mirrors
from the beginning
and on some level you knew that
but sometimes you have to do
the wrong thing
just to know you're still alive

so once again you've gone far afield
just to learn your lesson
traipsing through a meadow
dotted with toadstools
beside that Houston police station

Don Knotts' twin brother gloms onto you
at the hotel in New Orleans
breaking into an old barbershop song
and muttering inappropriate comments about
the young girl behind the front desk
as you stand there
trying to check out of your life
he was a tennis champion long ago
before the personality disorder set in

and you feel you need to wake up
from something
but you don't know what it is
and you know that nothing will ever be
the same again
but it will be the same again
after it's been different
for a long enough time

hey just try to find one
who isn't a little wacko
in some way
as crazy serves as the new norm
all fueled by drugs and booze and war
tumult and upheaval
the daily pressures of survival
as the TV screams
be afraid
be very afraid
and high school kids
serve as daily target practice
for the irreversibly deranged

our one slim hope to turn it around 
being to make "Jackie Blue" 
the new national anthem
sung at the start of every ballgame
the fans mouthing the words
with their hands over their hearts
so deadpan serious

and you 
console yourself 
with the epiphany that you see things
too clearly
with a grasp on the nuts 
of the problem
not commonly held
but once again you've squeezed them 
too tightly
as slippery sluts
slide through your fingers 
and you vow that next time
by freaking god
you will raise your standards
and use a little less olive oil