Storyteller

Bring me your poets and troubadours

your word-spinners and bards 

because I’m a slut for stories

it’s the only temptation

that will stop me in my tracks

you can forget about 

the upright qualities 

of masculine beauty 

lovely as they are 

I’m partial to a voice 

that can wind about me

like wood smoke 

with just a bit of darkness to it

a hint of gravel 

or smooth but burning 

on the way down like sazerac 

and a drop of absinthe 

in a cocktail 

that promises good choices.

I like heroic tales best

give me an epic battle

where the forces of good triumph 

I want to believe 

that we still can be heroes 

that all the virtues of humankind 

haven’t been wrung out 

through the generations 

tell me that kind of tale 

and I’ll lean in and be lost

because all the rest of the time

I’m telling those stories to myself.

Whisper close to my dark hair

there’s intimacy for you

the conveying of secrets 

I’m alive to it after years 

of learning music by ear and 

listening to the spin of the clutch

when I shift gears while driving 

I’m headed back up

to the top of the mountain 

where I came into the world 

and I’m waiting for you

to start storytelling.