Ode to Upchurch

"I like my poems. They’re
as good as rocks." - Alice Notley, Mysteries of Small Houses

Bud had all boys
across from Whitehead's
furniture store where Pegasus
delivered lightning
when we stopped 
to fuel the Impala.
I didn't know then what I know now,
and we trusted all those boys of his
not to jerk us around.
We shoulda asked Juanita.
Dad clutched and signed
a slip and moved on,
drunk or not, you all moved on
lunging left and right
pulling out and pulling in
to the Hitching Post
next door with a real one
right out front.
Patio orange for the kids,
blood and bar towels for the rest.
All those ponies and Medusa
riding shotgun, near the wheel.

 Here in the prime magnetic moment

so few and so deliberate, I won't say

I told you so but I told you so.

Yes, the secrets were secrets not

kept that way with purpose

but by definition of the secret itself,

out of our hands, completely out of our hands.

There is no forgiveness from the one

who has not the power to forgive.

There is no reward from the one

who has no power to render promises.

The magnetic moment shall pass again

and again until it freezes up and folds

into the homochirality of the records.

Time and the axis of time spins

on the axis of non time.