QUID PRO QUO, NO?

I love you,
you love me;
I do for you,
you do for me;
I hate you,
you hate me;
I make-up with you,
you make-up with me;
I kiss you
where it hurts,
you do the same
for me;
what's mine
is yours,
what's yours
is mine
endlessly,
forever.
You will shut-off
my oxygen
when it becomes
too painful
to breathe
without it;
or it's too painful
for you to breathe
being near me.
What's fair
is only
fair.

Please sign
here, here,
& here,
& date it.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

ME AND/OR A CIGARETTE

I have left you
one cigarette
hidden
in its obviousness.
You pretend
not to smoke
when I'm not there.
However, the hole
will suck you
into it
quickly.
We both know
you could not help
making this mistake--
it is what
you've been built for:
agony.
Many have been made
for that. Even myself.

You'll reach
for me
& find
a cigarette:
tubular pleasure
timed.
By simple reason
you'll not need
to smoke it
but you will:
reason, you see,
my dear,
like love,
is irrational
and most difficult
to reason
with.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

STAR SPANGLED BANNER UNFURLED

"Ladies & Gentlemen,
will you please rise
while we celebrate
our nation's colors.
Singing our National Anthem
are Charlie Patton, Sun House,
Robert
Johnson, Sonny Boy
Williamson, John Lee
Hooker & Elmore
James--all in, showered,
& cleaned-up from a hot day
in the fields, and members
of the Parchment Farm
Boys Choir; givem
a nice warm round
of applause.

(Those wanting to go
to the bathroom,
this
would be a good time
to do so...
And remember:
tipping,
while encouraged,
is optional)."

Batter-up.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

INDEPENDENCE DAY...OF SORTS

I miss
my toes &
my teeth--
the top ones;
I miss
the boardwalk
in Coney Island,
sea-soaked
& spongy
to the young beat
of canvas sneakers;
I miss
the fireworks
on Tuesday
& the cherry,
pineapple,
chocolate
or lemon ices
in thin paper
dixie-cups
dripping
sticky
onto my tongue
& face
& hands;
I miss
my first
furtive kiss
on the sand
underneath
the dark wood,
& the first feel
of tit
soft
powdered
titillating
& taboo
to young fingers;
I miss my father
letting go
of the bicycle seat
of my new Schwinn
two-wheeler;
I miss his arms
allowing me
to swim & swim
away; I miss
the first time
I punched him
& meant to hurt him;
I miss the first taste
of warm gin
& the first shot
of dope
no matter
how sick
I got; I miss sharkskin
pants & double features
& Nathan franks
for 25 cents
& riots
in the bars
of Brooklyn;
I miss the first sweets
from the breasts
of factories; I miss
the firsts of loves
& hates & spirals
upward
& downward & in
& out &...

but most of all
I miss the absence
of memory.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

MULTIPLE LAMENTS

You have
my heart;
I need it
back.
Don't
be stingy.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

THERE'S NOTHING AS HOT

For DG

as a good Catholic girl
gone bad.
All that genuflecting,
all those wafers,
wine, whispered confessions
in dark wood confines,
aged from guilt,
candles & sin & Hail
Mary's cannot predict
what's happening
under the hood.

She grew-up
in a Father Knows Best home:
Robert Young wasn't as nice:
patched-elbow cardigans
and a pipe-pinched mouth
didn't say a word;
a Jane Wyman mother
saw faces
in her apple pies
& named them after
Saints.
One day
all those Christ'
came off the cross
& hitched south.

I saw her
when I was charging merchandise
in Bloomingdales on stolen
credit cards and returning them
for cash to feed a junk habit.
She modeled and worked
behind the glove counter.
I had no choice
but to buy gloves,
many gloves.
If I were straight
a woman who looked like her
would have unnerved me; it
would be impossible for me
to approach.
But junk is the blood
of cowards. And every cell
that was still alive
moved me forward
despite the fear.

Her eyes were mahogany
but flecked with green
and lit with danger.
She was reading Mark Stranded,
John Ash and all those NY
concrete intellectuals; I read her
Roi & Paul & Hank & Savage
& put a smile on her face,
rhythm in her step & we
laughed & loved & fought
& loved some more & it was 1971
& we were in the thick of it.

And we did that off & on
for the next decade
& then split.
Our contact was few
& far between
until the other day.
She had sold off
The Father Knows Best house
& was living in a small town
outside of Atlantic City,
but came into town to see me.
We hit the old spots--
a little Italian joint, Emilio's,
and then Serendipity for dessert.
Nothing is lost
to memory.
Two old shoes
fitting easily
inside them:
a frigid winter night
in detox, her birthday,
she came onto the ward
in a fur coat
wearing nothing
under that
& we held the bathroom door
shut while we made it;
the Bukowski reading
at St. Marks while she took
me on the balcony & performed
her own verse.
"Remember,"
she asked,
"how I rouged my nipples?"
"Yes, I remember."
"They're not pretty anymore,
my tits; now you need a compass
to find them. Old balloons
at the end of a New Year Eve party;
you don't notice them anymore; you
just swat your hand at them
to get them out of the way."
"My dear, my dear,
my body is shot too--
fucking is like trying to shoot pool
with a rope."
"You could always make me laugh, Savage."
Her hands were more beautiful than ever:
her veins, blue and magnificent,
threatened to come out of her skin.
"I knew you'd age with the grace
of a Georgia O'Keefe, Jean Moreau."

We brought each other
up to speed and walked.
The hotel I had lived in then
is gone, as is Rumplemeyers,
most of The Plaza and checker cabs.
But we're no different. No older,
no younger. And not wiser.
We've made it
despite the odds.
We'll do it again
soon, we said.
We weren't stupid enough
to set a date.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014

MAINTENANCE

They say that life after forty
is "maintenance," but that's
bullshit. The real test
comes at sixty & beyond.
Once you hit
that number
you've entered:
The Departure Lounge.
Now some,
very few,
are able to fly
First Class, but most
of us sorry bastards
are in Couch. And some
poor fucks
are put in the belly
of the aircraft with
the animals and luggage--
nobody gives much of a fuck
if they make it or not.

Our shit
just breaks-down,
or gets rusty
from use or disease
or recklessness or
trumas, accidents,
love affairs and/or
the carelessness
of others.
And instead
of one thing
going wrong,
it's many.
The body just pops
with betrayals
large & small;
it's a shit storm,
an avalanche
of happenstance.

That's where
I'm at
now:
one eye
needs surgery;
my uppers cracked;
my winter's cold
seems to have moved in
for the summer;
my legs lumber
with neuropathy
& nicotine;
& my heart has
too much courage
for my brain's wattage.

I'd like to take myself
in for a major tune-up.
Put myself
on the lift,
and let an old German
or Italian who knows
his way around an engine,
an engine geared for speeds
starting at sixty--Porches,
Ferrari's--get under my hood.
Change the oil,
adjust the clutch,
time the carbs,
time the cylinders,
blow the dirt out
of the engine &,
if necessary,
change the shoes.
I'd lay on that lift
for a week--
why the fuck not?
--and be ready to race again
instead of nickel and dimming
my way to death.

"We will now board
First Class passengers
& the handicapped."
Some kind of justice
seems to be
at work.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014