morning walk

[constantine]

reduced polarity
i can breathe again!
hit the barrios
la barracuda for lunch
el cuisino salvadoros
had some arroyo conquista
pretty good - i dare say
the arroyo was a little grainy
but the conquista del sausolino
covered it like granny's feathered downer
a glass of fernet and i'm on my way!
life is on the upswing
the underpass, beautiful this time of year
i sit on the overhang by the tracks
where i can see the cars shooting the tube
i like it when i can see them and they can't see me
i can smoke a bowl in peace and space
into highlandtown then drift downward
through canton and drain into the point
a place we all end up at sooner or later
i hit the grind and the dead end
and wonder about the grime between the cobblestones
the bacterial cultures that live, die, and propagate
perhaps edgar allan poe hocked a loogie there one night
i'd even say it's highly likely that he did
it's the climate - the atmospheric conditions
fogs, mists and vapors from the sea
jungle fevers, sultry innuendos
it's the brine that gets to you
it gets in your blood and things get goofy
like a moral malaise, you loosen up
you drift from one alley to the next
maybe another bowl by the garage
then slink down portugal street
back behind broadway
i know there's a whorehouse there
believe me, i've seen evidence
i'm not an expert or anything,
but i can pick up a vibe better than most
picking up vibes is my business
i harness the vibes and then crank out
poetry like a goddamn poetry machine

[tarbaby]

u hocked me a loogie from home

existential ↔ a real beatnik© poem
I have walked those streets of Lowell since before world war two, but I can't go home again, a lone some traveler still

thank you for the letter from home

[constantine]

that little area behind broadway - regester, portugal , and the tiny alley behind the old white coffee pot still has that ancient grit - that sense of maudlin urban sorrow - that draws me like a magnet.

[stilltrucking]

that sense of maudlin urban sorrow - that draws me like a magnet.

that is what drew me too that little bar in the basement of the Roosevelt Hotel in the 19 sixties. Pictures From the Gone World, first poetry that got my attention, my ah ha as it were.
They used to have a sign behind the bar 'Have a Nice Trip' back when I was so maudlin was dead, I thought.

Maudlin wasn't he the guy that did the world war two editorial cartoons in Stars and Stripes.

[constantine]

not sure about mr. maudlin - what a moniker! like mr. lonely - only classier!

[stilltrucking]

loved the poem
i called Baltimore the sacred city on a thread somewhere on studio eight
I sanctified its streets with my blood.

your poem made me feel not so much maudlin (i have to look it up in mr black's dictionary) no so much that way as home sick. not just for my the gone city as my gone pictures.

I could not remember where Portugal street was, those little narrow streets, Madera St another one like that but no cobble stones I think.

one day lets hop on the old lear jet and fly up to mobtown to have a five cent milk shake with our arses hanging out in traffic.

[constantine]

portugal is immediately north and parallel to eastern ave - between bank and eastern

[constantine]

you go up madeira to get to choptank st and canary court

[stilltrucking]

funny i mainly wandered south of Eastern Ave down to the water front, maybe because I was two young or to afraid to cross that big street.

Bank St that is south of Eastern ave as I recolllect, I think we have had a conversation about Bank St before. I asked you about a variety store called Funk's which was one of the few places that would sell me amunition ofr my cap pistola

[constantine]

funk's was on fleet one block south of eastern - bank is one block north

[stilltrucking]

madeira st
maybe I spelled it wrong a street running between E. Fayette and Orleans st, very narrow but not an alley because the little two story houses fronted on it. very unique neighborhood I hope it survived urban renewal. a friend of my homeboy lived there, last name Robles, that might be Portuguese name?

[constantine]

yeah, it goes up that far - you spelled it right

[stilltrucking]

German Hill Road in Dundalk

[constantine]

is this where your dad's at? i don't live too far from there.

[tinkerjack]

Yes, Crazy Mike R.I.P.
I would like to meet you there sometime and burn one with you, "if the accident will"
"Which of us has known his brother? Which of us has looked into his father's heart? Which of us has not remained forever prison-pent? Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?"

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