Judy, your voice sounds like a wrecked car,
the vocal chords scraping against decades
of downers and uppers, worn thin, raspy,
months before they find you slumped
on a toilet seat.

Yet when you sing,
�smile when your heart is aching,�
I know nothing can stop you

from the next line,
�smile though it keeps on breaking,�

even though you are gaunt from amphetamines
your cheeks pressed against the bone,
nothing like the girl on a hay wagon
her voice leaping through chords,
so by the time you get to,
�though there are clouds in the sky,
you get by...�

I know your voice is as frail
as the light is as I walk under
street lamps, my shadow outpacing
me, striding by itself,
as if I could cut off
my fears and sorrows.

I see the poster of me
in my uniform
in the Rexall Drugs window,
number 32, starting full back
for the Hilltoppers.

There is a scar at the rim of my nose
where I�d slammed into bodies
of other guys
so many times my neck
will not turn left or right�

I know how to light up my face with gladness,
hide every trace of sadness.

I go out every afternoon
and give my body to the game
as if it were not mine,
as if I must keep on trying.

Nobody comes with me up Park Avenue
this time of night. The elms
claw at the moon.

You'll find life is worthwhile. . .
is that what you thought Judy
those last moments in the dead
of night when the lights of cabs
slithered across the streets

and you swallowed barbiturates?
Did you want to forget the lyrics
that made no sense?--

if you'll just smile,
come on and smile

You found your way to sleep.
I try to catch my shadow
on the empty street,
extend my arms and snatch it
and carry it back into my life.

I can still hear you sing
that one clear line
as if your voice were young
as if you could sing forever

If you just smile
Through you tears and sorrow
And maybe tomorrow. . .


�2007 by Bruce Spang