Morning Cherry

(album: Welcome To Sparks, Nevada - 2020)

Looking out over the Carquinez Strait
At the only highrise building in Downtown Martinez
In-between that highrise and Port Costa and Crockett
There's a long stretch of glorious mountains
Untouched by cement, untouched by man
The land is green, the land is brown
The view is sanguine, though the world's been so down
It's the beautiful California I've been dreaming about since I was a child

The trees are bunched together like broccoli stalks
Above them, dry patches, look like bright camel humps
The patches are dead weeds from the late-spring heat
That's what the mountains look like today

And boats are sailing out along the white waves and the silver water
Fishing boats and sailboats and all kinds of barges
My favorite barge is enormous, the cover are white and navy
The name of the barge is Morning Cherry
Hovering the water are seagulls, and inland, there's the vultures
The sky is blue, the air is mild
The cats are in by night, the coyotes run wild
This is the beautiful California I dreamed of as a child

Pacific, the hills, the lemon orange trees
Lately I'm feeling reticent, quiet, meditative and melancholy
Lately I'm feeling taciturn and uncommunicative
I've been spending time in bed laying still and listening to the wind
Listening to the train, the smell of the eucalyptus trees
Coming through my open windows and from my balcony
When I go walking I feel so frowzy
Oh my middle-aged, I feel it kicking in strongly
I feel aches in by bones and my posture has been lousy
By mid-afternoon, I'm always drowsy

So I'll walk to the water and take my time walking back
I asked a fisherman on the peer, "Hey, what are you catching?"
They say, "Stripers and halibut."
I say, "How do you have your poles rigged?"
He said, "30-pound test, and for bait we're using sardines."

Well one guy's got a band called Box Blaster
And he plays, "Hey there lonely girl, lonely girl..." over and over
Everywhere I go, every drugstore, every gas station
They're playing somebody's version of, "Hey there lonely girl, lonely girl..."
By Eddie Holman, Donnie Osmond, Shaun Cassidy
I guess the radio's playing what they feel are universal songs in the world
For the many women who've got cabin fever

And as for you, I'll always feel love and fervor
And it never leaves, it'll be there forever
Even when you're sleeping across the bed and you leave me here
To read and write and meditate, I miss you so deeply my dear
Went crazy, I wish you were sleeping here beside me
Right now, today, but I guess it's good to have our time away

Now and then I hear that train whistle blowing
From across the water or nearby, I hear a lawn getting mowed
Lately I've been reading John Fante's West of Rome
When you got down time, you gotta keep your spirit and mind uplifted and intact
When you got down time, you gotta do what you can do to laugh
John Fante's West of Rome, it makes me laugh

He's got a dog named Stupid who tries to hump everything he sees
He's got a wife that wants to leave him because John loves his dog, Stupid, more than he loves any other thing
And every time I turn on the news, everything looks so hopeless and bleak
Black guys found hung in trees, it's not the Jim Crow days anymore, we're talking about 2020

Black guy in Minnesota choked to death, another one shot in Georgia in the back
Watching TV all day is more toxic than smoking crack
But if I watched the news all day, I'm gonna have a panic attack
They're looping scenes over and over and over and over, if I keep watching it makes me feel wack

I care a lot, but I'm too old to be out messing around with protesting
Yeah, I'm 53, I've got nothing to prove, I've had blacks' backs since I was a kid walking the streets of Downtown Massillon
I walked the tenderloin streets of San Francisco, I walked the streets of New Orleans
And when we walked together, I've always felt nothing but love and harmony

I've got to enjoy the little things in life, like the way my cat scratches up my favorite chair, and laugh
I've got to look at sunflowers and the orange and apple and lemon trees and enjoy my salt baths
I've got to enjoy the California sun and the Bay Area breeze, you know?
And gaze at the water that flows between the mouth of Crockett and Vallejo
Wait for my favorite barge to dock, the big one, colored white and navy
The one that made my [?], Morning Cherry