A trick was stuck inside,
For as he composed, his head fell and rose,
But his hat would jump as he sighed.
"That's sick - what's in there?", I asked on a dare,
"Is it a trick or a ferret?"
"Either alive or takes orders, from the man at its borders,
could it be a snake or a parrot?"
He just winked, "Whatever you think,
I'm certainly not telling you!
Write me a script, and make it real hip,
and I'll think about telling the truth . . "
" I can't rid my soul of this dammed dogger-roll . . .
I hear it at night in my bed!
Let me hear prose, or smell a red rose . . .
This meter keeps banging me dead."
"We're minstrels with pistols, out writing missals,
the words inside us are stewing, . . .
"Perhaps in St. Louis, where the blues sound is truest,
there I'll give you some clue-in'!"
