Dear Steve,
The other day I yelled at a girl about the merits of country lyrics: she concluded us both tawdry, as I got lost along the road between folk and country. I detest obviousness and with terrible pride we went silently the entire way home.
When we first met, you were too young to play in bars so instead I’d sit at back tables of vague coffeehouses as you sang out against Vietnam.
Afterwards, you’d walk me home as the throaty-voiced girl began her set. The waitress lit candles. Each time before turning the corner, we’d look back to the flickering of yellow and green lights throwing themselves against window panes now starting to fog. Afterwards, whenever we met you were with a new woman. I decided they all looked the same and since it had become so difficult to speak on matters of the heart we resorted to asking questions we already knew answers to. When was your birthday, again? How is your steak? Do you love her? I remember asking one particularly cold winter how much you pawned to find answers to every question ever haunting me from birth. You showed me your wounded hands, speckled with dry blood from the biting wind. I pawned my home in Virginia and seven marriages with six women it seemed to say.
Honey don’t…I haven’t slept in years. I only speak in haikus now I would reply. Silently, you reached for the salt and I twirled the meadow lilies in the vase to face me.
Steve Earle and Reckless Kelly - Reconsider Me
Steve, Steve, Steve: I'll love you until the end of time. (And I'll never make you sad again.)
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