A poem (or poem-like thing) I started in 2013. Tinkered with again in 2020. Then 2022. Decided to let go today.
When I’m writing songs
I’ll often ask myself
”What would Elliott Smith do?”
A turn of phrase, an unexpected chord?
But when I’m as sad and lonely as I feel tonight
I try not to.
I’ll nudge myself over to safer lands;
”What would John Prine do?”
Or
”What would Tom Petty do?”
You can see how sometimes it gets complicated with musical heroes.
Still, sometimes, when I’m writing melodies
I often wish
I knew the notes Kurt Cobain would sing.
With that throat-shredding voice
Cutting through like those knives they used to sell on late night tv
that cut through anything.
He cut through metal for sure
both heavy and hair.
Red tape.
Black tape.
Depression.
He spit out sharp, earwig melodies
That could pick birds out of the air.
He ended it all
with a bang and a note
a Neil Young quote
a 20-gauge antidote.
The melodies stopped
but they echo still
for Nowhere Men like me
holding heart-shaped boxes
like fools on our hills.
When I’m trying so hard to be good
like many others I’ll ask myself
”What would Jesus do?”
(though I don’t own the bracelet)
But then I’ll think of all the good he did
And how he died 14 years before how old I am today
And what have I done with my one precious life?
Or even just those 14 bonus years?
For the people I love?
Have I sacrificed enough?
What have I done with my love?
Have I thrown the first stone?
Is there forgiveness in my bones?
Do I delude myself into the idea that I’m righteously overturning moneychangers’ tables in the temple when really I’m just petty and mad?
A never-ending parade of questions
but one that keeps poking its head out
is
Did Jesus ever question?
Ever doubt?
I wonder.
Did he ever just want to take a nap?
I do.
When I meet someone for the first time,
I remember how David Foster Wallace felt:
so worried about that someone I’m meeting
liking me
That I don’t stop to think about
whether I even like that someone I’m meeting
myself.
When I’m onstage
I find myself wondering
”How would Elvis move?”
That groundbreaking
hip-shaking
all-time performer.
How do you inject even a teaspoon of that
into this doughy action figure, bereft of moves and charisma and magnetism?
My body seizes.
The applause ceases
my mind freezes
And then, at last, I am like Elvis:
just me and my diseases
Surrounded by stuff I don’t need.
Glassware. Shame. Other stuff.
Craving peanut butter and banana sandwiches.
Packing on the pounds.
Rolling into Graceland.
And on the other end of the cultural spectrum,
when I’m feeling like none of it matters
Nobody’s listening anyway,
I think about Nick Drake,
who died, convinced he was a failure.
And I think about how
whether or not anyone
(in Drake’s lifetime or posthumously)
bought a Nick Drake album
or loved a Nick Drake song
or put Nick Drake’s songs in movies and Volkswagen commercials
or cried upon listening to “Place To Be” at a moment when they needed it most
or released a comprehensive box set
or made a tribute album
or felt seen by the idea of Drake’s Black Dog of depression
or covered his songs in concerts
or felt like the softest of lightning had struck when they—by chance—listened to Drake’s final album Pink Moon on a bookstore listening station
on a suitably rainy Saturday,
the songs were the same.
Take away
or add
anything:
Fame.
Destitution.
Anywhere in between.
Critical adulation.
Commercial obliteration.
Anywhere in between.
Take away
or add
anything
And the songs
remain
the
same.
That voice
that way he played guitar
The words he put to it all
don’t
change
one
bit.
Beautiful.