Clay Matthews
Hillbilly Music
Dwight Yoakum on in the other room
singing Guitars, Cadillacs, and I stare
at the empty bowl and wish there were
something to eat. Jimmy is on the couch,
a bottle of Bud perspiring on the table, his hand
in his pants, sleeping while the Packers
win another one at home. Mrs. Johnson
up the road is in the front yard with her son's
baseball bat giving a yellow rug hell.
I smack the couch and a cloud of dust
surfaces. I look at Jimmy and feel like
putting a pillow over his face. The lady
who lived here before us turned the gas on
in the oven, laid her head in a casserole
dish, and left it all with Amy Grant singing
something sentimental about Christmas
on the stereo. Jimmy said he's seen her
at night in a blue nightgown, and I wanted
to believe him until he said she asked him
to father her hell child. And so now the eggs
are all gone and the oven is empty.
I microwave some coffee and drink it
despite its dead black taste. Mrs. Johnson drops
the bat and wipes the sweat off her brow.
I nervously turn the cup and stare out the front window.
Something blue passes by. Dwight repeats again
The only thing that keeps me hanging on.
If You See Jimmy on the Corner
Jimmy prances through the living room
in a leopard-print thong and his mother says
from the other room To think you might
be buried in that. His Aunt May busy
needle-working a rooster, and I've decided
not to trust anyone who says I won't
bite. On the television someone is saved,
and they stumble back to their wife
with a blank look and a crick in their neck.
Jimmy pops his knuckles, one by one,
and I remember my sixth-grade English
teacher, Ms. Eaton, forever saying
Popping knuckles is an outside sport. Tonight
we'll play cards at Dan's house—one of us
bound and determined to make next year's
World Series of Poker. Jimmy shakes his ass
in front of Aunt May, and before the preacher
on the box says Can I get an amen she's stuck
a needled in his leg. Goddammit he says,
and his mother storms in with his father's oxford
shirt draped over her arm. She points to the door
and Jimmy thinks about speaking. But instead drops
his head, grabs Aunt May's long green coat
and leaves, wearing little to nothing underneath.
Mississippi Moon
Four in the morning when I throw the terrible paisley covers
off and stare out the windows of some cheap hotel
miles outside of St. Louis. Another winter and snow is coming
to claim the river again. The ice floats by, nature's barges,
carrying the promise of cold weather and a lone Canadian goose
heading to Mexico the easy way.
The window fogs and in reverse lettering I write sleep.
A lady in the parking lot sneaks her dogs into the back
of a minivan, rubs her hands together and then looks up
and manages a small wave.
~
In Panama City years ago, when the ocean carried in
the moon's last wish, I sat on the beach and listened
to the Doobie Brothers playing inside some dance club
the size of warehouse. Some fellow with a shaved head,
aside from a long braided tail, approached and gave me
a beer. Rat Dog, he said, and sat down on his cooler
beside my feet. The band was in the middle of China
Grove, when Rat Dog stared at my fingers
and asked if I played guitar. Long ago, I said.
He stood and stretched, stared for a moment at the lights
across the bay, took a drink and muttered, Fuck, I love
the Dead. After a moment I asked The Grateful Dead?
He said Yes, but the ungrateful even more.
~
The morning is now the color of in between, a cool
gray limbo, like something in a Goya background.
In the distance I'm beginning to make out the Arch,
and remember riding to the top with my father
in a terrible white box, reaching the destination where
twenty people bunched into a hallway the size
of a truck trailer with lower ceilings. They don't
tell you this, but when you get close to the windows
looking down you can feel wind coming through
cracks around the edge. And when you walk
towards the small exit, you can feel the whole thing move.
~
Late in the night, when Rat Dog and I had resorted
to putting our arms around each other and swaying,
he invited a group of middle-agers over to our party.
They were drunk, too, and so in no time we were lively
and hardly listening to the band. One of the other fellows,
a tall man with dark hair and penny loafers
with real pennies in the slots, stood up and said
A toast to Ms. Georgia, 1985. Rat Dog added Here, here,
and before I knew who they were talking about he made
a sash out of an empty Budweiser box and placed it
around the blonde. Later that night Penny Loafer
took off with some college kids who said there was a party
further up the beach. The blonde got angry, and then
walked over to another group. I was Ms. Georgia
she screamed, and then tripped in the sand and passed out.
~
The south side of St. Louis is completely Dickens
minus the tea and English accent.
Which is also to say it's a low den of smokestacks,
barges, and the constant sound of steel on steel,
echoing across the murky water. In some places
you can see the strip clubs lined up on the other side
of the river—pink and purple lights, and in the background
an electric plant buzzing like neon.
~
Before the sun rose that morning in Panama City,
as I walked back to my hotel, I passed a man
in a black leather vest with a beard and long hair
crying. He approached me and asked Do you know why
I walk this beach at night, every night until the dawn?
Before I could say no, he was into his story,
about his dear wife whom he loved, dearly. The fight
they had one morning long ago, her leaving in his semi
only to drive it through the rails of a bridge
and into the Gulf of Mexico. This is my punishment
he said. To wander this life until she returns.
~
Sunrise and light caught the silver ladder in the empty pool.
I don't know why I'm waiting to check out.
Three hours from now I will go home to my wife,
and find it more than ironic when Black Water comes on
the radio. I've spent this morning avoiding going back
to what it was I dreamed, and what I can't remember now.
I turn on the news and on the interstate there was an accident.
Another man in a johnboat is missing again
somewhere on the Mississippi. I lay down on the uncomfortable
pillows and turn to face the window.
The anchorman mentions drowning, then moves on to other things.
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