Rheostatics Follow

Martin Tielli

No small spirit, so gone, so brown,
With ashen tongues to clean the dirt.
Take this sad road full of me. Hate me.
I'm no innocent, sweet Carona.
Come on, let's go.

Straw-colored sea.
The cornfield swallowed the children up,
Never to be seen again,
About three fields back.
Blue shell casings and a groundhog skull,
A chipboard shack sits by the woods.
I wonder who lives there. Maybe he's dead,
Or maybe he's just watching us from the edge of the woods.
A soft wind wound up
And the rattlin' of the dead leaves swelled to hiss.
There's gotta be a hole in this
Row upon row...

The mothers went mad
And had the shack-man hung till dead.
He didn't do nothing except for being alone.
There's gotta be a hole in this
Row upon row...

When the rain beats down the last stalk
And the first snow melts from last year's crop,
Will they find the kids when the springtime comes
And realize they just got lost?

Way back yonder where the corn was tall,
Torn up dirty magazines scattered around,
Covered in dirt and rain.