well i went to new orleans sling-shot through the air



and i let the hot peppers burn a hole in my tongue



i went back to my birthplace and my first taste of air



so i could bury my blues in the sound of the accordion



i went looking for my lost home in the rising sun



i went to the corner where my pa painted portraits



and i looked for the woman who sold his brushes



not much had changed since all of those rites of

passage



the mimes in the quarter sold me fresh flowers from

their buckets



and under their greasy smiles i found their frowns



and under their frowns ghost of smiles



well the pagans they sprang from the woodwork and

shadows



and somebody shouted "hey, kid get out of the street"



some children threw water from a two-story window



it splashed at my ankles and then it turned into steam



and i heard somebody laughing so it turned to see but

when i



looked up that fire escape they turned their back on me



so i left fo alabama land of the red clay



where the kudzu crawls consuming all the dead and all

the living



where the water moccasins slither in the creek



and sun is the bright hammer that bruises everything



and i saw my life go by in reverse



so i followed it down to the crossroads



i watched my mother's first house burn to the ground



and that sacred old trailer was hitched and picked

clean



then i found the graveyard where the weeds split the

stones



and i felt the parents of my parents standing under my

feet



and they were holding me up you might say



then i drove parallel to a montgomery train



and i delivered myself back into the midwest



i arrived in the night while my brothers were asleep



i said the reconstruction failed again but i passed the

test



i went looking for my lost home and found none



but now i can sleep wherever i lay my body down