It’s always about the object.
“When he was thirteen he bought his first guitar.”
It was a Rickenbacker, they say,
And the number and model is specified.
A cloud is attached to the star.
The trouble with the story
Is always a motorcycle crash.
It’s never about the invisible poem
And the inspiration that turned to ash.
It’s always about a pint of whiskey,
A Southern intersection, a flatbed truck.
It’s always about a flight to LA,
Never about the music itself—
How he tried to write a chorus and got stuck.
You had it in your hand and still cried tears.
He tried to write that poem, that one good poem, for years.