Succulent Skin

Inhospitable

I don't go where it's inhospitable
where no people take hold of you
because they want your hold on them,
blowing the hurricane out of control,
sticking together through the inclement weather
forever, forever, and forever...

Until another day and the crew tornadoes out
past these heights to those of another city.
It's when you decide to stay behind and doubt
forgetting they're what made it fine,
what all of it is about, only now, pretty pretty.

Because without them it's really kind of a pity
going from reason here, to reason there,
remembering the time you ran with masters of this bittie,
and on to rhyming out with no pleasing air.

Fine wine's in season, but sours like treason,
dull aches come from what's now your cold prison.
Inhospitable listening no hurricane blistering.
Dry eyes on bare bulbs burning
in the bright light your stomach churning,
while sugar cane turns by turning
at the bottom of your coffee cup stirring
like a rush that got let down about noon
after a ride you could write home about, too,
and still remember in old age delirium.

Because you ain't no fish floating bottom up in this aquarium.
You're still that barracuda hunting and spearing 'em
only, with no dolphins to share in the spoils,
or to pod up with when the hammer needs to fall,
when Inhospitable loops up springing from fresh hot coils,
holding you liable for what's wrong with it all,
you got to recall what it meant to be tall;
the way hospitable kept you down with simple folk,
who would do what you do to make Inhospitable
join in on the joke rather than be the fool
he'll no doubt be when the dust settles down
and nobody is cool or free to blow another round,
and one or both of you is a memory
behind a friend's eyes from a long long way away.