Heart Of The Continent Lyrics

A north wind sings the fence around a lot full of debris,
near the corner of Memorial and me,
where resurrected brick and drywall leap back into place.
There's a terrified reflection of my face
all alone at the gleaming knife display in the Army Surplus Sales,
as the dusk descends and my inspiration fails,
and ghosts fill discount parkas, sleeping bags,
peer at me from the crumpled dark.

Inky bruises are punched into the sky by bolts of light
and then leak across the body of tonight,
while rain and thunder drop and roll, then stop short of a storm,
leave the air stuck with this waiting to be born.
As I stand before an unresponsive automatic door,
just another door that won't open for me anymore,
the EXIT red gets brighter, then blinks off,
and presses me into the crumpled dark.

There's a billboard by the highway
that says, "Welcome to/Bievenue à,"
but no sign to show you when you go away.
And our demolitions punctuate
all we mean to save then leave too late,
so I'll make my shaky exclamation mark
with a handful of the crumpled dark.