My thoughts remained elsewhere
even when the bar filled with
twenty-six-year-old cheerleaders
who found me to be the most charming
man in town by default.

My heart played confident music in a bed
sixteen blocks away. It probably wanted to know
where the rest of me had gone.

Why I couldn’t be convinced to relax,
deep breath, darling,
deep breath, relax
and just sit back, until you fall back.

The bar was packed to the pale gills
with gorgeous legs and a bank robbery plan
that fell through
when it was discovered that shots
were only a dollar until five a.m.

Free hamburgers
for any young men who couldn’t walk out
on their own three legs.

I shook my head a little and laughed,
but to be honest I had to think
of a private joke in order to be able
to do that.

It’s not that I didn’t appreciate the attention.
It’s not that I’m living for what I should have done
when time was all around me instead of waiting
on my capacity to get a grip somewhere in my late-50’s.

You wouldn’t believe me if I told you
about the things that start to make sense
when the lights kick in,
and the present is as good a time
as any to remember my lines.

Or you could grant me a small amount of serenity.
I could use it the next time I’m a stranger
in a strange perception of the land
that is never as sweet and slow as the woman
who once sang me just enough from the edge
to look up and see thirty billion cars speeding through the ocean.

Just before I paid my tab
one of the girls hurled to the floor
and screamed a point of view in what I think
was an intentional mix of Japanese and Russian.

I somehow broke my right arm,
but that didn’t stop me from smiling
and swearing to her that I had been listening
to her life story the entire time.

She believed me for a while,
and that became pretty glorious
near the end.

05/02/2011

Posted on 05/02/2011
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