GEOGRAPHICAL CURES & QUICK FIXES

We're in pain;
we're desperate.
We've all done it
thinking:
if I get away,
if I change it,
change something--
it's gonna lift,
the pain will ebb,
the desperation
will flame
out & only the sick
damp smell of
an extinguished fire
remain
and that, too,
will go away if
we just get out
get away
from the place we're at
it's gonna change
the place we're in.

I've done it
a million times
& seen it done
a million more.
I've gone from scotch
to vodka to gin to cognac
to anisette to wine to beer;
I've switched from dope
to coke to reefer to pills
& back again; I've backed-up
the woman I was with
to a woman waiting; I've gone
from New York to New Orleans
to San Francisco to Los Angeles
to upstate downstate in state out of state
to nuthouse in house jail house to ping-pong
to amnesia & nothing helps. Nothing.
Especially with love.
Don't be fooled:
love is a substance
harder to kick
than any substance I know.
It messes with the cool runnings
of the system, fucks
with your heartbeat
because it is your heartbeat.
I can take any addict,
any booze hound
& get them off the shit
in a matter of days. Easy.
But love, uh ugh. No.
Not real love.
You could be fucking someone else
tomorrow & it don't matter.
Real love loves
the imperfections
as well as the hook:
it's a molecular thing:
the scent, the smell, the taste;
the small dick & stubby fingers,
floppy tits, protruding belly,
insane pretentions, narcissism,
perfectionism, isms up the ass--
you still love them.

But try it.
By all means try it.
Try any goddamn thing.
I'll go to Kentucky
& become a redneck,
chew tobacco, shoot guns,
pray to a Confederate god;
or go to Australia & fuck
a Kangaroo. Around the world
& in the world.
Your mind,
if you have one,
does what it does,
perceives what it will,
connects what it connects
pretty much
without your help.
It's not even a matter
of standing your ground
& fighting. No.
You need not do anything.
Staying alive
is enough.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

TAKING A SHAVE

at two forty five
in the morning
is a wondrous thing.
You're alone,
but being alone
just makes sense
as the razor glides
easily; the motion
fifty years in the
crafting; the strokes
gentle and assured.

A beautiful thing
to grow old
when so much life
has been lived
through the broken centuries
of empires & loves
and the battles
of the common
and commonplace.

There's a steady tick
of rain against
the streaked windows
lit by lampposts.
A Mile's ballad
is filtered
through his Harmon's mute.
My hazel eyes sparkle
as I race from legs
& thighs, fingers
& nails touching me,
clawing me sometimes
bringing as much laughter
as pain
like toothaches
& abstractions.

A beautiful thing
to grow old
& still care
how you appear
to the female;
how you're the cock's crow
amid a mostly bland
and unappetizing fare.

If I could choose
I would have shot
pool like Luther
or Willie or Fats
& hustled for a living,
instead I wrote
and am happy enough
with that.
Now there's a softness
to that; an easy truce
with myself, an understanding
of workings and a balance
we know nothing of.

A beautiful thing
to grow old
& still get
letters from those
who responded
to words arranged
on a page. They believe
you have something to offer--
& maybe you have.

I lie down,
my face smooth
as a baby,
and allow thoughts
to come
& go.
I will not murder
these thoughts
tonight, but let them
co-exist side by side
drifting lazily
into each other
adjusting the picture
as I adjust my pillows
& my arms & my legs
& let time & sleep
have their say.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014