4403. A MILLION CHANCES FOR FORTITUDE

A MILLION CHANCES

FOR FORTITUDE

The slow creep of a nascent wind makes its way

past barrels and pallets. In this old yard of not

much there seems a designated feeling for every

plight : the orphan kid is crying, the old lady bends

over her cart, that pusher guy, or whatever, over the

little fence, is up to something foul. The locals have

even tried to grow a small 4th Street Garden here  -

a poor community fence, the amplitude of a broken

gate, and a few stones placed in the dirt to walk upon.

Everything is characteristically noble, yet dull. The

words I hear are fast, the syllables crackling, and the

tongue from a distant land. The lower land, of sunlight

and creep, seems always present : Spanish lace and

someone's forgotten mantilla. And, over in the corner,

some arty punk is painting a madonna on the wall.

-

I haven't the real energy to catch a corpse or steal

a cadaver. Let the dead bury the dead, and all that

stuff. Some guys peruses The Daily News for the

sports page stuff  -  hitters and winners and losers.

The story lines are always the same  -  graft, greed

corruption, sex, money death and  -  its better oasis -

hope; where salvation lies, anyway  - Hope.

-

I pass the poorbox at St. Ignatius' Church  -  the little red

candle-light is glowing. Next to it, the three girls of love,

at the bar, are sitting outside telling me their names :

Love, Lust, and Luck. All ladies, they claim to be.