7683. KNOWING YOU WHEN

KNOWING YOU WHEN

The carapace is crawling over the 23rd street

hump. I knew him when he had a body. The 

Chelsea Hotel was a hideout we shared  - all

things whispered of conspiracies feared. That

woman, the second floor one, the really scary

one, she'd wail at you, and then want your

portrait. We teased her to death with your dick.

Those large photos you kept bringing down.

The cigarettes, in red holders, she smoked.

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Now, so much of that is dead : she's long gone,

I heard, toes up in some Queens graveyard, 

painted now in stone, some wicked words 

above her head. 'I've withered, but grown. 

Had I only known.' What sort of epitaph is

that? Self written jingles where a

nice sadness would belong.

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The stairway and the elevator, both, nothing

worked worth a shit  - stumbling, crawling,

crazed or high, you'd stumble back, if only to

cry, for an hour or more about something

imagined. There were teacups in your rafters.

That's what I used to say; just so as not to

have to say 'bats in your belfry.' What a

funny phrase to describe the insane.

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What a funny phrase indeed.