7065. DARK NOW AND IT'S SNOWING

DARK NOW AND 

IT'S SNOWING

My mind is a fortress and outside the walls are men

looking back at me from their horses. They stare, and

then spit on the ground. I pretend I cannot see, and that

satisfies them. Behind them, as if on a scrim, runs the

noise and movement of the NJ Turnpike : somewhere

I seldom venture, where trucks run bent and cars are

lethal fractures. If the fabric of time can be rent, it

would from here the doing would be done. All the

trees hereabouts have been sickened and are dying.

The old apartments houses seem to lean, and the

donut people still line the Dunk-o-Rama, not

like they used to thirty-five years ago, 

but they're there. But today, no one

in there smokes. 

-

On the overhead sound system is heard some really

old song  -  a Tin Pan Alley thing, like 'Always.'

That confuses me too much, because all those

levels of overlapped time seem now only to get

captured by quaint, shiny entertainers, something

like Harry Connick, Jr., or someone, the kind who sing

for money and bend to the bows as a girl would, who

couldn't swing a mallet for shit. Girl-guys, that's it!

-

My undershirt is stained with sweat, and even somehow my

balls are sweaty  -  but I stay here no matter. If I can imagine

a winter coat, and big heaves of snow, I'm thinking I'll be OK.