Swayed - Joe Henry

In a scene from better times

Your traitor hangs up right there next to mine

The afternoon shakes down the trees

Like they owed it money -hey buddy, please:

Get in line—

Their promise of green fruit is gone

It’s bruised out there on the lawn;

He who cannot be seduced cannot be saved…

I hang ready to be swayed

Our hunger to be new begins

But slips the yoke like it was a second skin;

It’s walking back the shadow moon

As if on a string

A listing black balloon—

That turns its face and mounts the wall

To show a slower way to fall;

Oh, you hold me by a thread and fall away…

I stand hungry to be swayed

I’m torn to think this storm will rise

Already it’s tattered my sail and thin disguise

I ‘ve bent my song like broken words

Could call to me your whirling

Skittish birds—

I write to you, Dear stranger mine…

But stranger still, the hand of time

Has laid its ragged coat across our way…

I lie ready to be swayed