3rd Place | “Ride”

3rd Place
“Ride”
Frank Hogans
Chestertown, Maryland

North of Vicksburg, south of goodbye
High beam love flashing up from behind
Cotton row runaways steppin’ right along side
This is gonna be one hell of a ride

Memphis rain was all blue and gray
Made my regrets and my getaway
I’ve been laying up walls to stay ahead of this flood
But my paddle wheel heart’s still churning up mud

Nowhere to go except gone
You’re not the first to get my destiny wrong
Our neon night was just a boarded-up dawn
Nowhere to go except gone

Ten thousand snows, in a hundred white lines
Strung out for miles across the delta sky
All heading south,  we don’t know why
Wish I could coax these broken wings to fly

So if I’m on my way to someone else
Why do I leave these little pieces of myself
At every turn, every place I’ve been,
to find my way back to you again?

Nowhere to go except gone
I get ahead, but then I stay too long
I’m that falling star you liked to wish upon
Nowhere to go except gone

If you’re reading this, then it’s begun
This fog gets burned off by the sun
On this incendiary day
I light the fuse and run away