Muddy Hymnal

We found your name across the chapel door
Carved in cursive with a table fork
Muddy hymnals and some boot marks where you’d been
The shaking preacher told the captain’s man
The righteous suffer in a fallen land
Then pulled the shade to keep the crowd from peeking in We found your children by the tavern door
With wooden buttons and an apple core
Playing house and telling everyone you’d drowned
The begging choir told the captain’s man
We all assume the worst the best we can
And for a round or two they gladly drag you down
We found you sleeping by your lover’s stone
A ream of paper and a telephone
A broken bow across a long lost violin
Your lover’s angel told the captain’s man
It never ends the way we had it planned
And kissed her palm and placed it on your dreaming head