Promise of a Song

I wrote a song for her 33 years ago.

Her first name and last name initial the title.

I’d never written a song for anyone before—or since.

There won’t be another one.

A three-chord (A-G-D) guitar song somewhat in the hypnotic style of the Velvet Underground.

She saw my mediocre rock band perform it in a dive bar,

hearing for the first time,

standing in the front row,

sweat soaked,

wearing yellow,

tattoo dancing.

You are lucky if you ever get to see a face like that.

Part of the chorus:

Once was a cheerleader

now she’s just okay

Gonna go out and

change the world one day

Why does promise dissipate slowly or disappear suddenly in so many of us?

I’ve written so many poems exploring this subject of late.

What came along to entomb, waylay or derail?

Were Americans like this in the 70s and 80s?

Perhaps dissipation and disappearance

have always been there.

Maybe I can only see it now

because of confrontation with the past as you age

and what three decades the Internet has wrought.

I know I fulfilled my promise

when I became a writer,

unearthed and published lost Oregon stories,

restored wrecked watersheds,

re-materialized after personal extinction,

took care of my dying father,

read eulogies for men

who had no one to eulogize them,

rescued another dog,

learned how to become a friend,

got my homeless friend Mark into housing.

Whenever I play the song today,

it sounds like a dirge.