Candied Apple Red

I would have disappeared with you  
in teenage love  
and know-it-all dreams  
but you  
disappeared first  
   
   
   
I saw a cobra today  
   
nineteen-sixty-nine  
hard top  
in candy apple red  
   
just like the one your daddy surprised your mama with  
specially painted  
to match her lips  
   
and like the one  
we sneaked out in  
every other night  
   
to race down the back roads  
drinking beer  
smoking cigarettes  
being cool  
pocket’s full of jingle  
eternal roads    
minds full of endless hopes  
and wicked cool dreams  
with a Lynard Skynard soundtrack  
helping us forget the trouble we’d get into  
when we got home  
   
I saw a cobra today  
   
crystals hung from the mirror  
for luck  
 
beige interior  
silky smooth leather seats  
like the ones  
our bodies first tangled on    
and then melted  
   
where we created life  
then lost it  
   
where we had our first fights  
tears  
screams  
break-ups and make-ups  
   
Yeah I saw a cobra today  
   
like the one you were driving that night  
coming to pick me up  
   
like the one the drunk driver never saw  
the one you flew out    
head first  
staining the pavement candied apple
red  
   
before the ring box    
slipped from your lifeless hands  
   
I saw a cobra today  
   
like the one  
I would have gone with you
anywhere
in