older brother, restless soul, lie down

lie for a while with your ear against the earth

and you'll hear your sister sleep talking

say "your hair is long but not long enough to reach

home to me

but your beard

someday might be"

and she'll wake up in a cold sweat on the floor

next to a family portrait drawn when you were four

and beside a jar of two cent coins that are no good no more

she'll lay it aside

older father, weary soul, you'll drive

back to the home you made on the mountainside

with that ugly, terrible thing

those papers for divorce

and a lonely ring

a lonely ring



sit on your porch

and pluck your strings

and you'll find somebody you can blame

and you'll follow the creek that runs out into the sea

and you'll find the peace of the Lord.

grandfather, gentle soul, you'll fly

over your life once more before you die

since our grandma passed away

you've waited for forever and a day

just to die

and someday soon

you will die

it was the only woman you ever loved

that got burnt by the sun too often when she was young

and the cancer spread and it ran into her body and her blood

and there's nothing you can do about it now