In Tangletown
she sits in her car
outside the bar
in the dark part of the parking lot.
The faint glow from the end of a joint
is all that reveals her.It flares and dies
like far distant suns.It takes awhile for her
to get out of the Camaro,to walk a slow weave to the taverns' side door.
She enters an air of sound;jungle drums, moaning guitar, subterranean bass.
The song passes over her like familiar hands,touching raw inner places.
Her lover waits on the dance floor.In the center of the crowd she gives herself to him.
Gives everything she has... promises everything else.
The pot roars through her blood like a thunderstorm.The music rides her like lightening.
She moves as if calling forth rain.
Where others would write or drink,
fuck or walk,hit or cry, leave or die
to get away from what kills the soul,
it is the dance that keeps Tess
in Tangletown.