an ode to buddy guy & his well-worn blues

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buddy has me stone-down crazy,
weeping 
like a tortured woman 
in the creek.
he swears to me 
he will turn his lamp 
down 
low,
says god is painted in the azure 
and wool suspended in the sky.
and if the lord’s looking down 
on us sinners, 
faith is going to take his guitar 
past the aged-blue moon
and the blank stare of the face 
upon its dusted facade.
buddy     bites     into 
the golden hand of the blues 
and it still feeds him 
until he is heavier than a king.
perhaps he’s found me 
at a time in my life 
where i will believe
just about anything.
he leaves me at a crossroads 
where the only scheme
i can conjure up 
to exile this sorrow
he has left in my bones 
is to follow robert and make a pact 
with one of old nick’s sick fiends.
by god, 
buddy claims the only blues 
he has ever known 
was a woman he loved 
who wailed 
on one of those sunbleached riverboats.
all rivers lead back to the mississippi 
and wraiths of amour, it seems.
i swear on my old man’s grave 
i will go back 
down 
south
where old scratch 
still has a name i recognize.
undoubtedly, i will wait here
until the red brick dust
clears from the crack 
below 
this room’s well-worn door.
buddy has me 
s e e p i n g  i n t o 
the fibers of this soiled motel rug
like the strawberry ripple 
my sloppy drunk hand 
spilled
and ruined 
his precious denim 
and cotton overcoat
while rose cries 
from the radio, 
‍ ‍baby, 
please 
don’t 
go.
my nose is eternally open 
for his tobacco and cologne.