Swannanoa River Poem
Our beer is fresh off the union truck from the factory down the Baptist road,
cold in plastic cups cracked from the weight of replaceable beauty scattered
across the night-valley, forgetting when we were Carolina, when we were Georgia,
how our rifles were cocked and prepared for battle and virtue-less disagreement.
Some things last but refuse to stay the same, like dull outlines of gods and prophets
etched into the riverbed, washed away but never gone, invisible to our eyes
stripped of regret and dignity, cold and bitter and sweating in the deep Southern drum of night,
humming with crickets and open-toe shoes with soft souls for being spun by bristled old men,
and a banjo is calling hold me, hold me, hold me in the summer heat.
Desperate and dizzy and drunk when we kissed, I dreamed my love
could make your chest soft and round until the dried apple of my heart exploded,
revolting, and my proud coast of solitude and gray skies lit up
prepared for battle and virtue-less disappointment.