Tuesday, June 30, 2009

MILES OF MEMORY

pinstripes and polkadots
and swagger; a voice
sounding like his balls
are in his throat; full of gravel
and Joe Louis and, of course,
his horn
muted
by a love,
his love,
our love
of darkness. we wait
as peanut shells crunch
beneath 3 a.m. highballs
in the 9th circle
informing us
of style: the answer
to everything:
how to dress
who to listen to
or talk about.
our heads surreptitiously twisted
each time the wind
rushed in a body
not his
we casually turned back
to the conversation...
or shot glass... or chick
we were trying to make
while evenings danced
and everyone was young,
and brilliant,
and affected
with drama; our loves
dangerously alive
or thick with death
like wet ash;
music framing each intent
with motive, quixotic
and sublime in it’s queer logic
informing gamble
not yet oil slicked with living
too hard or recklessly. our precipice,
our wit. those who could not solo
got out of the game early; those whose ideas
came from books
were delivered
to same; never getting laid
they hunkered back
to Brooklyn or Jersey or Queens
to await marriage...perhaps dentistry,
perhaps both.

Those nights we passed,
how full
and empty they seem now
stuck in the mind
like gnarled venetian blinds;
yet they emit light
of a certain kind,
one that is informed
by pleasure.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 1999

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