Things Come Apart So Easily When They

Behind My Carefully Buttoned Collar Is My Nakedness, The Struggle To Find Clean Clothes, Food, Meaning, And Money. Behind Sex Is Rage, Behind Anger Is Love, Behind This Moment Is Silence, Years Of Silence.

And Of Course These Days I Feel Like There Is A Nation Of Us - Displaced Southerners And Children Of The Working Class. We Listen To Steve Earle, Mary J. Blige, And K.d. Lang. We Devour Paperback Novels And Tell Evil Mean Stories, Value Stubbornness Above Patience And A Sense Of Humor More Than A College Education. We Claim Our Heritage With A Full Appreciation Of How Often It Has Been Disdained. And Let Me Promise You, You Do Not Want To Make Us Angry.

Two Or Three Things I Know For Sure, And One Is That I'd Rather Go Naked Than Wear The Coat The World Has Made For Me.

Two Or Three Things I Know For Sure, And One Of Them Is The Way You Can Both Hate And Love Something You Are Not Sure You Understand.

I Told Her, Don't Touch Me That Way. Don't Come At Me With That Sour-cream Smile. Come At Me As If I Were Worth Your Life - The Life We Make Together. Take Me Like A Turtle Whose Shell Must Be Cracked, Whose Heart Is Ice, Who Needs Your Heat. Love Me Like A Warrior, Sweat Up To Your Earlobes And All Your Hope Between Your Teeth. Love Me So I Know I Am At Least As Important As Anything You Have Ever Wanted.