For no good reason

For No Good Reason by

As if you needed one,

as if you could help it,

for no good reason

a tune out of nowhere

pops into your head

when you least expect,

riffs effortlessly in the

folds of your cerebrum—

your own private jukebox,

your personal music device

on random minus the earbuds—

drumming itself up to keep

you company: here, a little

Janis Joplin while you vacuum

cat hair; there, a John Denver line

as you peel potatoes at the sink.

How can others not hear it,

this frequent odd gift?

Sometimes you forget

and blurt the words to the chorus,

which, after all, is all you can remember,

those take me home, country roads,

that feelin’ good was good enough

for me, even conjuring

the gas station in Colorado

back where you, wearing

those bell bottoms and that

paisley, were about to fill a tank

of freedom into the blue VW Bug

when Carole King belted outand it’s too late baby, now it’s too late

though we really did try to make it

and you couldn’t move, couldn’t

quit sobbing to the steering wheel

that would not console those blues

or say what you had left to lose,

wouldn’t question why in hell

you were going down that road

where for no good reason

you seemed to be heading.