myroots

My Roots

by Tim Gibbons

On a long ago summer day

of my green, hazy teenage life

I caught the bus

from Hamilton to Toronto

and dreamed my future wife

Down the 401 I sped with my

six cans of beer

I knocked off the last two

on Yonge Street

sat on a toothsome bench

and smoked a joint

Then I walked to the liquor store

and bought a bottle of rosé

began gulping that and

smoked a second joint

Then I stumbled around for a while

until I scored a lump of hash

off a perv in the arcade

The sun was going down

as I smoked that rolled up with some backy

Now I was ready

Finding a dirty doorway I

pulled the old brown box from

its cardboard case and

tuned her up nice

The strings were old and heavy,

Black Diamonds, and they hurt like hell

to press down the first position chords

E C A minor

I began to play and sing the

old country music

Kawligia

Hey Good Looking

Whole Lotta Shakin'

High heeled Secretaries would smile and

toss the odd quarter

Frat boys would stop

and laugh for a while

Suits would rush by

their butt cheeks clenched in fury

After a time a young native boy

tugged on my sleeve

"That's for you," he held out a twenty

"From that guy over there"

he jerked his thumb in the direction

of a buddy -- a blind

Indian in a wheelchair,

his black hair shoulder length over

a greasy green army khaki

I walked over to him,

"Hey man, are you sure about this?"

He said "Yeah man, keep it. That was

the best Creedence I ever heard."

I thanked him and asked him to hang on

to my guitar for a minute.

I rushed around the corner to the liquor store

and got another bottle of wine

I came back and we passed

that bottle back and forth.

The old country music rolled and rattled

I didn't even have to try

The Green Green Grass of Home

Mansion on the Hill

Haunted House

Six Days on the Road

The music channeled through me like a

silver satellite beam from a radio tower on mars

We drank and told each other our stories

At last the bottle was empty

and it was time to go home.

The teachers of high school all told me

I'd never amount to a pinch of coon shit

and they were right.

[Distillate © HA&L + Tim Gibbons | {from the Greek bios} -- the course of a life.]

A clever manœuvre will return you to issue 1.2 2008 [geschicktes Manöver {n}]Or bathe in the light of issue 0ne:

Embark [from a place of refuge] Content [Distillate: issue one.1] Contact [complete the circuit]