Saturday, March 9, 2013

NOT MY TYPICAL SATURDAY

The Betty Poems


I am
a creature of habit
usually: up early
with a hearty, oh shit,
to start the day:
brush teeth,
put up coffee,
shower,
coffee--a sip, a cigarette--
read the papers,
another coffee,
another cigarette,
then another of both,
get dressed,
gather the weeks dirt:
work, frustration, a little less
hope and throw them
all in a laundry bag
to take them downstairs
where they will be washed
by America's new class
of exploitation and shaky
documentation.
It's just about 12:00,
high noon. And like Gary Cooper
I just walk
across the street
to a showdown
with the bad guys,
the killers,
only, unlike Coop,
it's a showdown
with myself,
on the page--for
I am the killer
and I am the hunted,
having already made a lifetime
of enemies, I need to wait
for no one.

I do not walk
into a saloon,
but a tea parlor.
I don't ask
for a shot of red-eye,
but for a Carolina Honey--
medium size and hot.
I take it to a table
as far away
from another human
as I can find,
and take out the book
I'm currently using
to defend myself with,
and a notebook.
I read awhile,
then scratch
against the silence;
read some more,
think about the scratches
and the scars
that disappear
for a second and the armies,
now frozen,
somewhere in my head's battlefields,
standing still
and slugging it out.
I'll work it
for as long as I can,
then shop for dinner;
stop and get the momentary
illusion of something clean
in my hands again
and return to my lair....

But not this Saturday.

This Saturday
I had Grace Kelly in my bed
perfumed and primed;
love had found its way
through doors
I no longer had keys for;
her eyes saw
what I tried to bury;
her mouth and fingers and hands and teeth and tongue and breasts and legs and ankles and cunt
found me and allowed me and welcomed me
home and I opened
to her and with her and for her
and as we spent each other
more was deposited and Friday
became Saturday
and I didn't think
(thank the gods)
about laundry
and tea
and food
and composing
because I was composing
and being composed;
because I was being sung
and singing
and it was so beautiful
as to be unreal,
but it was real
(I swear)
and it was real again
the next day
and the day after that
and, at this point,
that is all
I know
for sure.

I must remember
to take
a breath.
And so do you.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2013

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