Play Me the Blues   Play me the blues — oh God, play me the blues, and make it the slow kind, in for the long haul, the last of the light, make it a blues that knows that I know, a little bit wrong, a little bit home, and give me the blues that earns a hard righteous dollar and spends it because that’s what dollars are for, blues in the empty night, nothing to pretend, nothing left to hide, give me last-call blues, slow-dancing, come-to-Jesus, what-the-hell blues about careless love and secrets, blues that hurt just right, hurt me here, if I fell for you it wouldn’t even matter blues, your tongue down my spine blues, the body wants to feel something deep, something real, and blues is what the body wants, it wants to dance, it wants the pulse of blood and pain, it wants the blues.     © Michael Fleming Brattleboro, Vermont July 2012