WAITING FOR MR DEATH. (STRONG LANGUAGE)

[dadio]

Meet me on 42nd Street Brock said
In that small bar where we met that
Saxophone player that time and so
You went along and sat waiting for

Him and the barman said what you
Having? I’m waiting for someone you
Said. Want a drink while you’re waiting?
The barman asked giving you the quick

Once over so that you could almost hear
His brain ticking up dreams or fantasies
With you naked and him fucking you with
That glass eye of his looking at you like

A dead star. You declined and looked at
Yourself in the mirror behind the bar as
The barman with his glass eye walked off
To serve someone else at the other end.

You took out a cigarette and lit up and
Watched the smoke twirl slowly upwards.
Your father used to let you help roll his
Cigarettes between your small girl’s fingers.

Lick it with your tongue Lizzy he’d say
And you’d lick the paper with your tongue
And sometimes it used to stick to your
Tongue and he’d laugh and years later

When cancer ate him up you watched
Him roll his own cigarettes coughing up
Phlegm the colour of death and fighting
For his next slow breath. Brock never

Showed so you ordered a white wine
And sat gazing at your ageing self your
Big cow eyes listening to the men in the
Bar talking and laughing like buzzing flies.

[still.trucking]

Nicely done

"it wasn't god who made honky tonk angels"

[joel]

There are images here I really find myself drawn toward...the interplay between rolling the sigarettes in youth and watching the phlegm come up at death...but especially the eyes: the coldness of the glass eye in the bartender and the wide, open, warm depiction of a cow's eye, even in advancing age. Doe eyes are sweet, but cow eyes are vulnerable and passionate, knowing the pain of birthing-and-milking and the existence of slaughterhouses. I like this so much.

[dadio]

thank you, still trucking & J oel.

[ToXic aPplE]

My favorite line (or two) is

That glass eye of his looking at you like

A dead star.

Gotta say, I love it!

[dadio]

thank you, toxic apple.

[rite]

Yummy

[judih]

a thick sit at the bar
but such a silken painting tenderizes my experience

[dadio]

thank you, rite & judih

[creativesoul]

i feel like i have been there! loved this, very intriguing

[dadio]

Thank you, creative soul