STEAM HEAT

A serpent's hiss
in the pipes
of my old brownstone
in Greenwich Village
on a freezing February--
only it's November
& we are caught
with our pants down
around the ankles,
& our balls,
made of brass,
clangs against a stiff cold radiator.

But the sound is enough
to alert the blood
that soon
very soon
it will morph
into a St. Bernard
carrying a keg of brandy
around its big furry neck,
as the steel warms.

And that hiss
is enough to settle you,
locate you,
like a bag of dope in your pocket
right after you cop,
the sickness at bay,
& you lean back into it
knowing it won't take long
to be enveloped
in that cocoon of warmth,
made well,
flushing the zero
from your bones--
not as lovely
as opium vapors
perhaps,
but a drift
by any other means
is still
a drift
into the
ease. You light
a cigarette,
put on some Monk,
and wait.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2019