Snowflakes in Spring

Marlene

My Marlene
Your shoes still at the door
Your kisses on the white tulips
Haunting my core
Pictures you took of the azaleas
Outside the windows
Make me feel an ache
So deeply, I crave to replace
Maybe with a dancer's take
When May comes
You will be long gone
Somewhere in up state New York
Never counting your drinks
Or looking for something more

Marlene, my love
Come back to
West Virginia
Appalachia calls to you
Like wildflowers in bloom
Lay down for a second, Honey
Don't you feel it
Something you feel the need to replace

Appalachia won't call for another
Your heart beating as fast
As the free wind
Promises faithful weather

Don't you remember
Swollen feet
From running so hard in the rain
Your dress a lonesome shade
Like London on a rainy day
Looking as if it could fade

Won't you run back
This time, dearest Marlene
Your vividness will fill
The waning light
And these mellow skies

The vast nights
Have been amiable
Smelling sweet like brown suger
With peepers filling away the silence
And the memory of a girl's presence
Still iridescent

Where have you been
Cause I thought this could last
Maybe not forever
Just something to make the hours pass
If this was love
You would've come back already
Sobbing in my arms
That you were never ready

Now it's me
Alone and wondering
How you were ever ready to leave me here in Appalachia
Without even a cell phone

With vast echos of your laughter
Mending away through the mountains
And a lost boy
With a new heart to contain