The Man Who Fell in Love with Neko Case

Seeing as how she has a new disc out, I thought I'd share some lines inspired by Neko Case -- from a few years back....


The Man Who Fell In Love with Neko Case


What thoughts I have of you tonight, Neko Case,
all because I walked past a half shuttered farmhouse
with its scraggly forsythia and bottle-thrown windows.
I heard your seraphic high notes in the distance,
stuck in a canyon at dusk with nothing but sagebrush and tears
to scare away the coyotes.
I imagined you shirtless and brazen at the microphone,
smoldering looks to the ushers and the college boy in row 12,
asking about their nightmares and if they love their mothers.
Your hair lights up the darkness –
a pile of glowing embers from some burned down cottage.


In the concert hall, Garth meditates on his Lowrey,
channeling Bessie Griffin like a teleprompter.
And you, Richard Manuel, what brings you here
to the sound stage? Was it you who passed along your muse
to her fifteen-year-old runaway soul?
Where will you take me, Neko, after the show?
Will we walk to the airport and watch the planes take off?
Will we touch each telephone pole, one after the other?
Or, will we run all the way back to Tacoma,
looking for battered front porches and empty swing sets
with rusted chains?


--Michael McIntyre

October, 2008