When the Night Falls to Pieces - poem

When the night falls to pieces
and a little solace is all I want,
it's as simple as an old, battered LP
and Patsy Cline singing,
"Crazy, I'm crazy for feeling
so lonely." Who can blame her?
These are the slow, deadly hours
where nobody can ever love us
fiercely or faithfully enough
to make us believe in the world again.

Patsy, the century's clock is winding down
and I'm too deep inside an endless Sunday night
where the movies are all choked
with black and white betrayals.
Step out of the slow, worn music in my head
and the cracks and hisses filling my life tonight
and come close, come true.
Together we could make the long run
past the state troopers and Missouri blue laws
to someplace where the bottles pour empty
as freely and falsely as memory.