Pulaski

She was fresh out of college The first one in her family to go and California seemed like heaven, Pulaski, Tennessee was her home She worked on losing her southern accent and turned her back on her Baptist ways She bought some clothes that barely covered her fair skinned body, Went to Nashville and caught a plane The clouds rushed beneath her as the LA smog filled the air She smiled when the airlock opened and the Pacific breeze blew through her hair She thought about the boys from Alabama Who came into town every Friday night and drank beer out of big glass quart bottles and left their trail of blood and tears behind She thought the men from California would be different She'd grown up watching them on her TV But the men she came to know in California Left her longing for Pulaski, Tennessee Good ideas always start with a full glass and just breathing here can make a girl's nose bleed Dreams here live and die just like a stray dog on a dirt road somewhere in Tennessee The storefronts all filled up with eyeballs As the policemen clear out the street For a line of cars with their headlights burning Driving slow through Pulaski, Tennessee