Learning The World - Mary Chapin Carpenter

Brief lies quietly on the passenger side,

Unwanted company on a long, long drive.

It turns down the quiet songs and turns up the dance.

It goes where you go, it’s been where you’ve been.

Pushing your empty car mile after mile,

Leaves you’re weeping in the wilderness of the supermarket aisle.

And iIn the late night kitchen light it sits in a chair

Watching you pretend that it’s not really there, but it is.

So it is and you ask

«Are you predator or friend?

The future or the past?»

It hands you your overcoat and opens the door.

You are learning the world again just as before,

But the first time was childhood and now you are grown,

Broken wide open, cut to the bone.

And all that you used to know is of no use at all,

The same eyes you’ve always had have you walking in the walls

And the same heart can’t understand why it’s so hard to feel,

What used to be true, it’s now so unreal, but it is.

So it its and you say

«I wish I were the wind, so that I could blow away»

Brief sits silently on the edge of your bed,

It’s closing your eyes, it’s stroking your head.

The dear old companion it’s taking aback

Watching you pretend it’s not really there.