Her Bones, Her Pinecones

Another tribute piece for the lovely Joanna Newsom, whose music inspires me so much.

Sadie, with her white coat

Never carried me home

I knew her not

Nor played fetch with her

Nor stroked her tenderly during the middle of thunderstorms

Nor called her name in a fit of jubilance

 

Her white coat couldn’t comfort me

How could I expect it to?

 

Yet her bones, her pinecones

Touch me, and leave burns upon my skin

And her master sings to me

And kisses my burns, for she was burned too

Burned so deep in her flesh

That her bones too were scalded

 

Joanna is her name

I’ve never met her,

But her she sings solemnly to me

And I drink her words

I drink her song

 

And it fills me so deeply, so holy.

It’s as if I’ve known her intimately for decades.

We will grow old and die together.

 

So I listen to stories of bones, and pinecones

And Sadie with her white coat.