Don't Pay Heed To Temptation

- do y'all have any headache medicine?

- there's bottles of it behind the bar.

somebody's telling a strip club story of 5,000 down to 5.

the hippos are being electrocuted in their tanks all around me.

like frogs in the slowly boiling water.

like the rhinos in heat fighting for control.

walkmen like cigar store indians still watching over me.

this is where i'm ended up.

the same yes the same ol same.

with a hometown cocktail just the right touch of french.

more than herbs than can count.

"dye your hair yellow and raise yo hem"

lawyers talk about shows i watched to hear bands sung by singers i met one night to have drinks with years after my french class crush had faded with ex-girlfriends whose hearts i broke by giving in to the poor planned staying arrangement desires instead of spending nights with improv friends who first illuminated the academics of language before disappearance into unknown frontiers into which i had once trekked with broken hearted ex-girlfriends of the men whose women i then loved with women who lived with women i had once almost loved when my own were somewhere else being beloved by loving strangers over the phone...

it all comes back to somethin don't it.

and all this over a hometown cocktail that never was my own but the drink it sure could be.

the hometown where i once met that girl, no not that one, or that one, nor that one, but yes, her right there, for a lunch just to run into the past i had left behind and had seen the day before.

something else?

naw, the something same.

the shrimp and grits were perfect.

"what i want you to remember as i disappear tonight"

good strong drink makes the connections.

just like the time i was with but still without that girl no, not that one, not that, no wait yes her in the city where i was with my girl.

- it's such a good message for the kids.