by: Chase Twichell
It's ridiculous, at my age,
to have to pull the car onto the shoulder
because Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash
are singing "Girl from the North Country,"
taking turns remembering not one girl,
but each of their girls, one and then the other,
a duet that forces tears from my eyes
so that I have to pull of the road and weep.
Ridiculous! My sadness is fifty years old!
It travels into sorrow and gets lost there.
Not because it calls up first love, though it does,
or first loss of love, though both
are shawls it wears to hide its wound,
a wound to the girl of which
all men sing, the girl split open,
the sluice through which all of childhood pours,
carrying her out of one country
into another, in which she grows up
wearing a necklace of stones,
one for each girl not her,
though they all live together here
in the North Country, where the winds
hit heavy on the borderline.
_____________________
Sitting at home in my living room after a weekend of incredible activity.
I'm feeling drained. There's not a whole lot left in my tank tonight. I recognize this feeling. When I used to do a lot of theater, I always experienced this moment after I was done with a show. Sort of let down and a little sad.
That's why Saint Marty chose this poem. It touches upon that melancholy.
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