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