Tight To The Jar - Kelly Joe Phelps

It’s a ditch, okay.

I have shoes and a blanket

My head resting light on a stone

Though it’s hard it’s still rounded with a pocket for brains

Or what goes for in halls under roof tile

We’ll sing another blistering ballad for grandma

Melody sweet till it rolls out the ear

And the beer flows free as advice

With a tight hand holding the jar

A tight hand holding the jar

The mud cakes my chin strap, fills up my cuffs

As I plod, now, from creek edge to street side

As it dries I can whittle it little by little

«Hey, look, now I’m light as a bee»

And those gray clouds mean nothing to one such as I

Though shadows stand tall as some school master whack

On the back of a well intentioned quiet kid

With my arms held around the jar

My arms held around the jar

And it’s slow, so slow the idea

The coming around of a sensible world

It hovers and shakes like a hummingbird wing

At the end of a long hot year

At the end of a long hot year

So fry up that supper, we’re going to kill it for breakfast

As we turn the table down side and crazy

With the legs up, the women up, the men up to church

For the spirit, the hen yard, the bent steel track rap

It’s a ditch, yeah, I know that, and, I do wonder

How that bright faced, ten year old me of a boy

Found the road out I never, I never could see

With my arms held around a jar

My arms held around a jar

And it’s slow, so slow the idea

The coming around of a sensible world

It hovers and shakes like a hummingbird wing

At the end of a long hot year

At the end of a long hot year

At the end of a long hot year