Voodoo Cowboy

Hey there, stranger,

Where were you                                              when I crossed the phantom prairie?

In your footsteps, sai sojourner,

                                                Describing the shadow path.

                                Well you sure did, stranger,

                                                                                And stranger still

I felt that you walked with me, hoofed and horned,

                                On yonder mountain, when the sky called out for blood.

We must carry our demons, say it true,

                                For times we find the clouds a-bursting

                Red and wet with murderous hue

                                                So we might put them on the altar,

                And spare our dear lambs the slaughter

                                                                That is demanded in those red times,

                To turn them back to blue.

That’s one neat trick there, billy kid,

                You bleat riddles in mannish tongue,

I can almost forget your satyre, walking upright, tall hat tilting,

                                                                Sporting long coat, spurs & gun.

Tell no lies, for I have none.

                                Six chambers in a wheel, certain

                And stars beneath my boots and at my heel,

                                                But mannish?

                                                                Neigh and bray

                                                                                And no to that.

                I’d sooner suck straight from the udder

                                Than lock horns with that bull.

Sure then, stranger

                                Be your own animal.

                Just answer me in that fine cud;

Why did you                       take that path?

Yours to ask, ours to answer,

                                So sojourner, here’s your meal;

I found those shadows had no mother,

                                father, sister, child or brother

Yet in every footfall as I ground the stars I herd the peal

Back from the chimes as notes were shed, they rustled and ran

and their cattle prattle

made music that rewrote what was real.

In the shadow dark

I found my light

And rode west along the dusk

To find the sunset owed to me.

                                                Harken, stranger then and stranger growing,

                I fathom little from those depths,

                                Though the ocean is enticing.

If you leave me in this desert, then I yet do ask;

Which sunset is this                        you dare call yours and yours alone?

Sweet sojourner, martyr me,

                And know the plain face of that sea

                                Where legs can’t walk

Where lungs can’t breathe

                                                Where cant can’t scream or stutter out

For flesh is flotsam, waving ‘bye

                Though spirit swims with dorsal affinity

                                Nothing nets the scaled song

                                                Of the dervish-dancing soul-trout.

Know you now my desert grey? My sunset switch? My latter day?

                ‘Course, O cowboy, friend of mine, I now get what you say,

It’s Death, not so? I might have guessed, I saw it in your eye.

The mid-one, ‘tween the sidelong pair, that looks hawk-blind from my seat,

and if you neigh, why then I say, death’s no further than your belt.

                This is a revolver, and its work is revolution.

Play roulette if doing so pleases. Only one in Six is death,

                For that’s just one solution

All the others, just as deadly, just as lovely, thirsty, lucky, just as

fine a fingered end

                                To point at any sweet sojourner

                Who might think to tease this.

Hup-hup there, Stranger! Not so brisk, I’ve got no mind to offend

                                Or go seeking any end before my time.

Mayhap another question suits you, or perchance could uproot you

                From your jangle by the scardy-scarecrow of my crop

                                Let’s see…

What brought you                           to this dim and darkling love?

Love and death are on my banner, and ever be my way

                Is it so odd they love each other, trust each other,

                                                Slay each other,

                Sharing fate and feast is not the least

                                                To mate the pair.

Know the chaos of violent men eating one another in gulping greed,

Know of guileless children damning themselves by walking paths they never knew were wrong,

 Know the shearing words of sheep lost to their creed,

Would you yourself not walk into the sunset?

                                I’ll restrain my verdict, shadow walker.

When is it                            that the clock ticks last for you?

Clocks run out not, but on and ever on.

                You cannot open a door before there is a passage behind it

Death is a journey

                To forget that is to dive into waters hoping for air,

                                Trapped in the rigors of flesh that so betrayed you.

When do you ask? Not where?

                                When is geographical.

Past the phantom prairie, down the shadow path

Along the silver tracks of ghost trains, shrieking as they pass,

Through mire and marsh of zombie dreams, dragging down into the mud,

Beneath the lotus forests, where black petals push from bud.

That’s where my sunset finds its snuff, in the drench of the sea.

That’s where my darling lady Death awaits her dance with me.

One last question, I’ve for you,

I asked you where why which what when, now who

Who are you, sly cowboy, horned and gilt,

In prophesy and gibberish

                                                Of unrequited death and love?

                               

Call me Stranger, for truth is,

                                I go by more names than I have faces

                To express the wit and whim of every one.

Now I’ll leave you to your crop and crow

Your devil-dust and demon winds.

                Well, sojourner.

                                I hope for rain, for your sake,

For happy ends to those things ending

                                                                And beginnings filled with hope themselves,

                                                                                Just ‘round the wending wheel.

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