Bum

I was within the red velvet ropes

Waiting to get into a club

Down in Chelsea.

I saw him a half a block away.

Homeless and hobbling

With all of his gear.

“He’s coming for me.”

I told my friends.

“Watch.”

“I’m telling you that he’s coming for me.”

I watched

My friends watched 

As he strode directly up to me

With purpose

Approaching nobody else.

“Son...Where have you been?  I’ve been looking all over for you.  I’m hungry.  Please

  buy me something to eat.”

I’ve had weirder things happen.

But I called this one

And I felt triumphant

Like I should be allowed

To go to the front of the line.

That didn’t happen.

I gave him five bucks

And told him I wasn’t his son

“That he wasn’t fooling anybody.  Go get something to eat.”

I waited in line

With everybody else.

My importance only noticed by a homeless man

And not the bouncer
At the front of the line.

Wing Dam

It’s the nicest day

Of the year

So far

And I have a nice

Buzz on

As I walk out

Upon the concrete

Abutment

Angled 

In crooked fashion

To the center of the rushing river.

The water is higher and faster

Since the thunderstorms

Made the valley

Their home

The last few days.

I walk past

A whole striper

Gurnied out

On the pebbled pavement

Cooking in the sun.

Only his eyes are missing.

Excerbated neatly.

The skin is dry.

His demise 

Was recent.

The sockets of his pupils

Still pink

And the body’s flesh

Firm

Neither bloated

Nor sunken.

There were no flies yet.

I lied down 

At the very end

Of the stone...

At the spine of the river.

I felt the same warm sun

As he once did

Baking my still intact eyes

Wondering

What the last thoughts

Of a wayward striper

Would be.

Knowing that he had 

Fucked up big time

Landing on the wing dam

Gasping his last breath.

The birds swooping down

Quickly

In those final moments

Being the last thing

He saw.

He really fucked up this time.

I fell into a solar-drenched stupor

The water at a summer high mark

Rushing around me

It’s fierce noise

Calming

The animal

Inside.

Black Butterfly

You flew singular and black

Amongst the endless acres 

Within the overgrown sunwashed pale concrete

Of a long ago abandoned

Railroad yard.

Trees and shrubs had grown

To 15 feet high

Within the 2 inch cracks

Of weather beaten 

Pebbled pavement

Obscuring a once desolate

Vacant view.

Greenery suffocating

Miles of abandoned railroad ties.

Steel lifted for it’s value

Leaving precisely measured 

Worthless wood 

Bare.

The velvet black of your wings

Was easy to follow

Against such a harsh contrast

Of man-made colors

And the natural hues of greens.

Yellows.

Wheat sheaf-like white

Of the dormant or dead.

The pale summer blue

Of sky

When you rarely flew high enough

Preferring to stay low to the ground.

You led me to the abandoned architecture

Of a water tower

And I was thankful.

Almost immediately

The sky to the west 

Grew dark

And I saw lightening.

It was still clear here.

Still blue.

Black wings fluttered.

You made me feel safe

And I didn’t run.

Belmar

So

I'm at the beach

Laying on a blanket.

Beautiful women everywhere. 

360 degrees 

Of feminine stomach

Ass

And thighs.

At the beach

I don’t look at faces so much

Or listen to their

Conversations.

That would kill the illusion.

I just observe

Like I am in a bird sanctuary

Or an animal preserve

Or sitting in a modern art museum.

I revel in all of the details

That makes each woman unique

And original.

The colorful plumage

The stoic gate

The palette and brushstroke

That captures the curve of a muscle.

There's a cutie with a booty

Laying out right in front of me. 

Alternatively

But no less appreciative

A black guy bounces by 

With his crew 

And I hear him say 

"Oh shit!”

“I'd roll my weed on dat ass!".

I heard poetry in his critique.

The Edison ‘Fireside’ Two-Speed Cylinder Phonograph

He lived in a rent-controlled

One bedroom apartment

On the fifth floor

Of a six floor walk-up

At 346 East 20th Street

Between 2nd and 1st.

Across from the chainlinked

Pale-washed concrete

Of the basketball courts

Loitering next to 

Simon Baruch Jr. High.

It was the second tallest

Apartment building on the block.

It would take him

A good fifteen minutes

To journey 

From the noise of the street

Up the hard

Cold stone steps

Of the stairwell...

His leather soles echoing

In the building’s common space...

Until he arrived at the familiar door of apartment 5B...

Taking pause

To catch his breath upon the way.

He was 76 years old.

As he put the keys into the locks

He could hear the low murmers

Of his pets inside.

When he stepped through the door

To the hallway’s interior

Geschenk and Kleine Scheiber

Would weave themselves

Inbetween his polished shoes

Purring.

“Daddy’s home”

He would announce.

The apartment was clean

And simple.

Sparcely furnished.

Meticulous

Like his shoes

Which he had polished

Twice a week

By his regular guy

In the Union Square subway station.

The cats laced their way

Inbetween his feet

As he made his trek

Into the living area

Which was furnished with a sofa

A floor lamp

A chair

And his beloved phonograph.

It was the one thing

That he carried

Through his later lifetime.

On the streets

Up stairs

Through relationships.

He listened to it every morning

With stove-brewed coffee

And every night

With a glass of wine.

He didn’t own a television.

Never felt the need to.

He had his Edison ‘Fireside’ cylinder phonograph

To entertain him.

His was from 1905.

He didn’t buy it then.

He purchased it in the 1940’s

At a pawn shop

In Time’s Square

With a few cylinders

And was hooked ever since.

He poured a glass of wine.

German.

Trollinger.

Just like the phonograph...

It was a habit of his.

A rich red.

He took the glass

And sat down in the chair

Next to the machine.

Kleine Scheiber immediately jumped into his lap

Taking her place.

He put his glass

Down on the side table

And picked out a cylinder

From the box by his feet.

He inserted it into the mechanism

Putting the needle

At the end of the suspended wooden horn

Upon the shiny roll

And cranked the handle

On the right side of the box.

When the pressure felt right

He then released the switch in front

Letting the needle begin it’s path

Left to right for approximately two minutes.

The blue wooden horn

Echoed with such a warm well-rehearsed sound.

He raised his glass

And gave a toast

As he always did...

Taking a sip of wine from the motherland.

He tilted his head back

In the chair

Rubbing the content Kleine Scheiber around the neck.

She purred loudly

And he could hear it over the music.

She was languid

Like he was

Waiting for the music to end.

Feeling his body suddenly move

As he searched

For another recognizable

But wonderous song

From amongst the library

At his feet.

To again fill the air

Of the one bedroom apartment

And the empty basketball courts

Across the street

With a recurrent

Imparted joy

Gratis

To anyone passing by

Taking the time 

To notice

And listen.