Words of Acadiana

 The desert  Likes young boy flesh  Bones she can chew on  Feeding off of the fat  Chewing on your gristle  Secrets just under her surface  Tender and new  Unrealized  No angel’s gonna come  You’re out of saviors here  On your own  Desolate  Desperate  Left to little resources  The desert  She’s got a spirit  She must be blessed  Beaten  Battered  With a gun to your head and your face in the dirt  No pity  No pleading  Just the echoes of regret  Call out  Begging for any way out  Think I heard him sell his soul  As the bullet left its hole  Not even a shallow grave  The desert  She’ll look after you  Just as the cowboy is the Indian’s friend  The pain will soon be over  And you’ll never be in this place again  Your spirit will fly  As your carcass returns to its organic nature  The desert  She smiles  Drunk on sacrifice  How come it happens like this?  Happens all the time 

  One day your skull will be as empty as a conch shell on a fence post, full of wind and gentle quiet.   Today it’s a cauldron of ghosts. Flesh and electricity. Water and memory. A machine that makes reality.  Now. Here. Your skull is a garden. Trying to process trauma into beauty. 

  Like Georgia O’Keeffe   I want to be left alone  In the desert  The desert of my mind and creative spirit  Free of societal constraints  To tread paths that ancients before me knew  As the sands of time evaporate before me Slowly I’ll meet my decay  Righteously my bones shall bleach in the sun  After my skin has fallen away  I’ll return to the stars  Of which I’ve come  Endless  Boundless  Not trapped in a flawed pile of flesh  The cycle of life and death  No longer gripping my neck  Gone  I’ll be of the mountains  Of the streams  Alive in the sky  I’ve faded to ether  God’s hands 

  I am open to receive   To believe  In the powers that guide my spirit  Apaches  Like the feet of my ancestors  Running and roaming  Taking root in the now  In being  Exactly where I need to be  This desert  Once a primordial sea  Buried secrets  Fundamental truths The veil is almost nonexistent here  The sun sinks into the Davis mountains  At night the spirits roam  Like horses in my dreams  Thundering hooves  Shaking the ground around me  Tectonic plates  Shifting  Energies  Shifting  Learning how to unlearn  Walking to crawl  Such beauty in this slow living  In lunar cycles  In knowing  That I am receiving  All that I need to grow  Into who I’ve always known was me 

  Circled myself in salt   The moment I locked eyes with you  Cigarettes and regret  The writing was all over the wall  Like a blood stain  Destruction loomed  Even as lust bloomed  Attracted like magnets  Opposites  Sometimes working in sync  Mostly working against each other  Scheming in the night  Secret messages and meetings  You had one foot in my door  And the other in others  Yet somehow you’re still my favorite ghost  Eyes so green They looked backlit  Emeralds in the dark  Hair like a raven  In search of things with shine  You found me at a time  That I was blind  A baby witch in my infancy Had no idea the atrocities coming to me  You fed on my heart  Left my decaying carcass on display  As you ran off with your next victim  So I dove deep into the earth  Deep into myself  Let nature lap at my gaping wounds  Masturbated my lacerations  Spoke to the trees  Whispered to the birds my deepest desires  Faced my fears all alone  Emerged as a new force  But still with a hole in my he

  Blood from my fingers   Treasures in my hand Dug beneath the surface Found the soul of this land  The heartbeat  Vitality  She was born in the winter  In an abandoned adobe  A witch  Watcher  Doer of what needs to be done  If you cross her It’s best that you run  For the magic that resides here Knows nothing of right or wrong  You get what’s coming to you  Whether it’s love or it’s harm  I keep my feet toasty  By the fire in her breath  My love like the ocean  Is of unknown depth  She speaks of Ocotillo  Of light and love and peace  She deluges the desert Coming down like rain in sheets  Soaking beneath the dust  Permeating the earth  Giver of her soul energy Unaware of its worth  No laws in this land  It’s of your own hand  Your creation or destruction  Slips into being amongst the sand  The gods aren’t domesticated  Heaven is overrated  Don’t worry of your hell  Scream into the void  Your secrets she’ll never tell  Marfa  You’re all I’ve left to sing to  So I sing my heart out into

  Met him behind a church in New Mexico   More like a chapel  A raw adobe structure where they’d worship  Worship a being; a presence  Faith is something we hold onto when we have nothing  Still not sure if he was an angel or a demon  But my heart fluttered upon meeting him  Quiet Beguiling  Face to face  With my dusty face  The brim of my hat left a swath of my face exposed to the Western sun  So my right cheek was terracotta  Mixed with the sweat  It created its own adobe  Rife with organic material  He made me his muse  Vaquero dreams  Bandana around my nose and mouth  All you could see was my cheek and an eye  But it was enough  Enough to draw him in  And he seeped into my being  Being someone who could  His powers were subtle  A wizard in waiting  Not the priest they thought at all  He had a darker energy  Less benevolent  Sneaky even  He dressed in all black  I was in a serape poncho  Glory riding high on my head  A face off at sundown  Good vs. evil  Or at the very least, less g

  Love like ghosts   Chills me to the bone  Tread this path all alone  Figure I’m better off on my own  Cuz these thoughts of you live in my head  Run me over and leave me for dead  Emotionally numb to anything but hurt  Can recognize it in you  But can’t see my own worth  You wrapped me up in your love  Bathed me in the moonlight of your desire  Now all that’s left are the embers  Smoke and ash from our fire  Am I such a dark force  Am I misunderstood  Baby I’d try to hold on  If I thought I could  But this love stuff never does me right  I pack it up and leave in the night  This desert, my one true love  Just me and the sky and the stars above  So don’t take it wrong  Let the words of this song  Roam the halls of your heart  And sew me up  Cuz I’m torn apart  You were the one I could’ve loved the most  Tell me baby I’m your favorite ghost  Cuz the love is dead  Gone but not forgotten  A pretty carcass by the road  Bloated and rotten   Love like ghosts  Chills me to the bone  Tumblew

  I died in the desert today   I buried myself with my own hands  No fancy coffin  Not even a pine box  Just an open pit dug by hand  Fingernails full of desert dust  In a month all that will remain are my remains  I’m buried in a shallow grave The rain may expose my bones  To bleach out in the sun  To rot  To return to the land that birthed me  Silenced but not forgotten  I’ll carry him with me still  This older version that no longer served me No longer a part of my journey  I watched as the beauty of his youthful face slipped away  Now I am reborn  I can recognize my new potential  Not having to obtain perfection  Or youth or beauty any longer  I can March on with my wrinkles and my weight and my graying, thinning hair  Aware  This funeral is inside of me  And it’s not for anyone else to understand  All that remains  Are remains  Excavated memories of what once was