RED DIRT – repost

[Note: sorry if you are receiving blogs that you've already seen; I'm still in the process of recovering old blogs that were lost in the transfer to my private domain]

Ace & Me, downtown Los Angeles

Above photo from April 2014, at the Ace Hotel, downtown Los Angeles, formerly the United Artists theater palace. Nice to see this movie palace preserved. The hotel is a pretty hip place, maybe a bit over-hip in the design department (some of the walls in the office are covered with shaggy fur… exposed wallboard has paper artist sketches… no place for public hanging out but the espresso bar stuffed with hipsters… I’m not complaining, just reporting here…)

 

And now, some poetry... This is a serial piece I’ve been working on for a while, and this is the first part of it. Not sure what to call the parts, but I guess we could call them chapters, and this one will be called “Red Dirt.” If you like it, check back later for the category “The Written Word.”

 

 

RED DIRT

I rode us home in a cloud of red dirt

me in my crooked face and my last Sunday shirt

Four hundred miles to OKC

it seemed a little strange

you riding in back

and the dog up front with me

but it’s a long drive

and by then you were just a box of ashes

headed across the Red River

to an appointment with the wind

&&

I was down to my last two ideas

suicide, or a country song

&&

I sat down on this bed

peeled off my old tired boots

Red Wing Iron Rangers

been around the world

twice-resoled, forever faithful

these damn boots

have earned a rest