OLD MEN WITH FISH EYES

The Chinese shack is closing;
ageless men stack beaten wooden chairs--
4's & 6's & 8's
--on table tops.
The skinny cook,
a #2 pencil of a man,
dribbles ash
as his ducks & chickens rumble
over the blade.
A nick of blood pools
into the soy. How many fingers
make a dish?

A lean Grayhound idles
at the curb's edge.
It waits, tail pipes
leaking dreams and
impossibilites.
Plastic red bags
holding oranges &
midnigt transgressions.
A fat blond whore,
mascara covering her fallen lash,
leans into her ride
rife with determination,
uncovers an almond cookie
and bites into its core;
stale, the sonofabitch
fucked me, she thinks.
It is only the first
of many lies
in the first of many hours
she will have to endure
before the first of many truths
becomes clear on Monday:
the crap tables are unforgiving
for hot women
of limited
resources.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2019

YOU THINK IT'S EASY

waiting
on the muse?
Try it
sometime.
Ya sit, sit, sit...
& nothing. Fucking piss.
Not a goddamn thing
to get you hard.
Sit some more
waiting
for you to appear,
to give me
a reason
to go on--
a slim one,
I know,
but baby
these are some mean fucking times;
& ya take
what the dealer
deals. Then
you cheat,
steal, lie,
squeeze those cards
for all they're worth:
sometimes,
not much;
sometimes
a fortune.

I'll take
my chances
with you.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2016

MARILYN,

her corpse turning 90
today, celebrates all
who whacked-off to her
in their dreams
& her solitude.

And I'm being picked-up
& driven, by a new squeeze,
to shoot craps
near the Atlantic
City boardwalk.

Win or lose
it will be
a better day
for me
for sure.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2016

OBSESSIONS

are our jailor's key:
they lock you up,
they lock you down,
and they let you out
just long enough
to crave the relief
they offer: a dance
on the head of a pin
called death.
They simplify
complications.
They ease
bordom.
They give rise
to fantasies
only fantasy
can provide.

Work, gambling,
eating, sex,
drinking, drugging,
masturbating
ourselves
endlessly
& forever
is surely
preferable
to the dull
monotonous
routine
that dog's
our days.
To be caught
is to be
liberated.
Where are they?
Who are they with?
When will I be with them?
How will I be with them?
When will they call?
Should I answer?
Will I answer?
Should I call?
How will they come back?
Will they come back?
When will they come back?
Are they fucking?
How are they fucking?
What position are they in?
How big is the cock?
the breast? the wallet?
Do they think of me?
When do they think of me?
How much to bet?
The next meal?
Draw to a straight?
Twenty minutes to three, twenty five minutes to a drink, the taste, the smell, the first sip, the going down, the settling of nerves, the feeling right, normal, OK, seventeen minutes to three...or five, or midnight, or three a.m?

Writers write and painters paint
to make vibrant the dullness of time.
The great Karl Wallanda said:
"Walking the wire is living,
the rest is waiting."

And now,
my waiting,
begins.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2015

POETRY,

she said,
is your strong suit;
you should stick with it,
play it; it's what you do
best.
You think?
I replied, fishing
for compliments.
I do,
she said,
comfortable
in her judgement.
I should know,
she continued,
being a gambler
myself, I know
suits...of all kinds, but
I also know
that you think
because it's you
who does it well,
anyone
can do
it.

I had to go,
I said, eager
to get off
the phone-
she was getting
too close
to the
bone.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2015

WHY NOT?

There's a woman
who wants me
to shave
into her mirror.
She's also
a gambler,
though she wins,
she told me.
Texas Hold Em
doesn't appeal
to me
the way five card
does, but gambling
is gambling.

I told her
that I'm best
at playing
with myself,
with words,
I mean, letting
them tumble around
& land
with a freedom
I'm hard pressed
to allow
into other
areas
of my life.

I'll help you
enjoy yourself
despite yourself
she said
& smiled.
Maybe
she can?
We'll see.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2015

THE BOARDWALK

in AC
was damp,
chilly,
underneath
a slate-gray sky
and bluish black waves
with a cockscomb of white foam
leaving the sand with a froth.
We sat,
as we had
forty years ago
when everything
was in front
of us.
The failures & madness
and a suicide world
filled with regrets
sat behind us
dressed-up
& greedy still.
It felt good
to shiver
with all those lives
hanging
in the
balance.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

WHAT ARE THE ODDS

that a nine year old girl
from New Jersey
would be on a firing range
in Nevada,
outside of Las Vegas,
firing an Uzi
with the burly instructor--
who stood next to her
slim shoulder
with his arm
wrapped around
her tiny waist
--and still manage
to shoot him
in the head?

The name
of the range,
Bullets & Burgers,
is family friendly
unless
you're the family
of the shooter,
or the family
of the dead,
or the little nine year old
who saw the blood & brains
of her instructor on her little pink shirt,
or the eyes & brain of her instructor
in the second when he realized he
was no more.

If you own
Bullets & Burgers
you're in good shape:
more business
for a hot table.


I've heard
the bookmakers
have taken this
off the board
for tomorrow's
action.
What
a pity--I thought
I had an angle
on this one.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

A SMALL PRICE TO PAY

All of us are born mad, some of us remain so.
--Beckett

Many people
throughout my life,
including my parents,
teachers, casual friends,
bosses, lovers and other instruments
of control, have said to me,
in these words,
or similar ones:
"Grow the fuck up."
"When are you going to stop
being such a goddamn child
& grow-up, do something
with your life, make something
of yourself; when are you going
to matter?"
I never knew
how to answer them.

The process
of socialization
is supposed
to make that happen;
to exchange,
in effect,
the metonymic
for the metaphoric.
It never happened
with me.
"Things"
which ideas
spring from,
are still, for me,
contiguous. "Shit"
comes out of "sirloin,"
"reds" live next to "goblins,"
"love" can very well be
a "crucifixion."

No, no,
you must work,
you must save,
you must listen,
you must be disciplined,
you must be nice
to others & pray
& marry & have children
& work & work & work
& put your shoulder
to the wheel

which I have,
but in a odd
way. Awry, askance,
coming at myself
from a backward
angle, words
have been my most constant
friend and lover
and the few friends
I still have
are still at it,
too--whatever "it" is
and whatever that means.

It's easy enough
to stamp your feet
when you're two,
and not move,
and shake your head, "no,"
"fuck-off," "get lost,"
"sorry, ain't interested."
Not that much harder
when you're twenty,
even thirty.
But past that
it gets
just a bit
harder;
the mortality rate
exponentially higher.
Few do it well
because few do it
at all.

The "house"
is society.
Like Vegas
they never
lose. They
have patience.
Eventually
if you stay
at the tables
long enough
they're going
to own you.
Except now.
Except
for me.
At nearly
67, chipped away
at, clipped, tired
as a motherfucker
I'm still swinging it.

Now,
I'm playing with
the house's
money.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

BREAKING OUR MAIDENS

Take all your plans,
all your schemes,
your handicapping,
take all your "sure bets,"
"locks,"
your systems,
your "definite s,"
your "absolutes,"
"no doubt about it,"
all your "don't worry,"
your "trust me, it's in,"
& shove them
right up
your darkened
bunghole.

Noir or rouge
could come up
a million times
in a row
or never,
you might roll
nothing but sevens
or seven out
before a point
is made.
Drawing
to an inside straight
might or might not
get filled
without rhyme
or reason
no matter
how much
you're able
to count.

Some are born
sucking
on enormous breasts
filled with sweetness
through endless nights
while others suck
an empty pouch
and get bounced
around liquored
lovers screaming
holiness & murder.

Each time
we do something
we break
our maidens.
Each race
is the first
we've run.
Tomorrow
might be the day
you get up
and find blood
in your stool,
or step on a President
on your way to work.

Nothing has worked
for me
the way I thought
it would
or should.
And even though
I've had my share
of good fortune,
especially with women,
I've not been that fortunate
with machinery, money,
or health.

If I get up there
and sit at the feet
of the gods
I'd ask them why
they've kept me
in this crap game
for as long as they have?
I'm guessin they'd shake their heads
& say: "We don't have a fuckin clue;
we really don't."

And that,
as they say,
is that.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014