cookie man

[constantine]

cookie man could always score
always
if the eastside was dry
we'd hit the west
didn't matter
he knew everybody
lester and snooky
tidy bowl and john-john
cram into the red fairlane
sherry would drive
met her at a party
burnt out on flakes
sitting in a cabinet
under the kitchen sink
when she was twelve
she got a's in latin
warmth, intelligence
in that photograph
crazy sherry, she told me
at least a thousand times
about her uncle carlo who
took her to the tarzan movie
at the strand where they
tied a native to a couple
of trees and cut the rope
and was split in two
and carlo put his hand
between her thighs and
the native was split in two
and the blacks went jungle crazy
pounding hollow logs and beating
drums in sweaty heathen madness
that just wouldn't stop
over and over and
if she was doing coke
lookout, sherry's tale
of ancient and irreparable sorrow
would rise in pyroclastic indignation
foot smashing the gas pedal
red rocket on 95 swerving
past the point of no return
into the eastern avenue exit
how many times
a thousand permutations
distilled
into a gray, tepid mush
that you want to spit out
but coats your mouth
like that sick taste you get
when you're coming down with something
after an hour or two
you wanted to blow your brains out
but only after you blew her brains out
back at cookie man's
we fired and got loaded
fucked up in a bad way
got the shakes - cotton fever
laid down on the couch
as sherry leaned slowly into my face
droning on and on about
tarzan and uncle carlo
i begged her to stop
i looked into her cigarette ash eyes
and asked her for the love of god
to please shut the fuck up
i'll never ask for anything else