Wednesday, July 18, 2012

3786. CHINATOWN

CHINATOWN
The nickelodeon was spent, the screen behind the
glass was gone, and fifteen chivalrous soldiers led
the way to both time and reason. Not knowing what
a capstan was, I never ventured forth to see. The
flowering Chinese woman at the old Mayflower Cafe,
well, she was a different story : Tong War maiden,
Nationalist Party lackey, fevered yellow whore - I'd
heard her called many things like that in my day.
At the end of Mott, or one of those crazy streets,
they had a chicken in a booth. For a quarter in the
slot, that chicken somehow would dance and peck,
and out would tumble some sort of crummy prize.
I always wondered how long the chicken lasted and
how many they had to replace. It all seemed
so callous and crude.
-
That's the way it is and was  -  not much changes
in the realm of the sorry and sad. I think of a hundred
things at once, and realize they're mostly all sad.
Especially here, in Chinatown  -  or at least some
nutty old Chinatown of the mind : ducks, glazed,
dead, and roasted, hanging on hooks from their necks
in the restaurant windows; piles of hacked, webbed feet
for sale; stupefied, fat fish, rolling low in a tankful of
bad water; diners selecting their things to eat while turtles
play on their death-watch in small, plastic tanks. I have to
move on, giving thanks, I guess, for the smallest of things:
-
the light shining off that puddle, glinting its way
back to me; the little girl, shyly blowing bubbles off
a plastic stick, while her brother plays, nearby, in the
open tenement doorway and along the stoop, rolling
small toy cars along the three bottom steps.

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