7828. DESPERATION SANDWICHES / PICKLE EYES

DESPERATION SANDWICHES / PICKLE EYES
Why am I standing here now? On the corner,

an old tavern that sags, announcing its place

with old Oliver and Hardy mornings when old

gents start milling around. The miller in his

capstone features drags along. It's dark inside,

and no one's yet discovered light. The soul is

a spiritual cascade, a chiaroscuro of moving

form. One man, with is cane, points left.

-

Adventure runs its course: The girls who marry

and take the other's name, nowadays they get

forgotten quickly. William Wilberforce, the

man who outlined English slavery, forgot

about that one. Hyphens now, to the rescue.

-

Why should I make anything clear? I am barren,

and so my words shall be. Here, alongside

Houston Street, the broad traffic runs to

Brooklyn, maybe  -  some old lady's garden

kept well in memory of that very same shade

and dark. People pass, in ones and twos. In

today's world everyone is pleasant and sweet.

-

I can remember near this very same spot when I

was thirty : you'd be killed for your nickels, if you

wanted, and sneered at or beaten for a smile.

Don't do it, and don't walk here, where Bowery

crossed Houston  - not worth it at all. The girls

had all been jumping, for over a hundred years,

their vagaries of sin eventually here to win.

McGuirk's Suicide Hall, that tavern and

whorehouse was called back then.