Categories
Date Night
Tag: Cincinnati
it’s never quiet
in the city at night
however i’ve found
if my boots are planted quietly
amidst 3am lamplight
standing in space once occupied
by a storied brick house where my
great grandfather aged 90
lived and died
i can hear elm street recalling sadly
that he left for the hereafter
decades before i arrived
sunlit green leaves flicker over
a cincinnati restaurant patio
sunday brunch amongst contemporaries
a skyline mural
of an astronaut
looking to the stars
above our heads
downtown buildings
turning toward the sun
glistening libations
sweatily klinking together
a toast made to the ending war
fully vaccinated folks
introducing themselves as such
shaking hands
faces aglow with possibility
shoulders swaying
to kettle drum music
masks off gently
seeing smiles
for the first time in a year
our festive nature quickening
heartbeats once acoustic
have gone electric
the gentleman at the table beside us explaining
upon reserving his table
he’d requested a framed picture of Bill Murray and a congratulations card for “Jeff”
to await his party upon arrival at their table
there is no Jeff of course
restaurants who agree to accommodate his request
are how he chooses where to dine
when traveling out of town
our laughter turning on
theatre marquee lights
no one interested in food
it’s spring
the whole city has tickets to a Redlegs game
we have survived the plague
everyone is tired of eating
tired of fearing
tired of dying
yet everyone
seems ready to fuck
Categories
pretty little things
there’s a girl downtown
gets passed around
she’s early twenties
but plays smaller
she hallucinates snakes
as demons prey on her
there’s a girl downtown
she walks around
bare from the waist down
hacks at her own hair
is fond of defecating on sidewalks
but the winos and scum
buy her pretty little things
so they don’t feel guilty
after
last night
shots rang out
slicing August’s midnight miasma
a quivering queen city listened
as Cherokee bells
echoed over cobblestones
black swan feathers topping lost hopes
filling horse-drawn funeral carriages
eighteen shot
four dead
blood pooling at the base
seven screaming hills
four shootings in Cincinnati
ninety fatal minutes
national news coverage
backlit red images
of our violent infection
suffer do we
these slings & arrows
whispering sacred prayers
to a god unlistening
please make
every bullet fired
explode into a spray
of evening primroses
10 pm
fresh out of sin
headed for a sip
in a bergamot tearoom
I became distracted
my January boots
compelled
to follow memories
through puddles of patchouli oil
stalls peddling shiny baubles
half finished dissertations
and bohemian postulation
stopping abruptly
at Biagio’s Bistro
fine Italian cuisine
featuring a gourmet dessert cart
a self service bar for the regulars
despite having
no customers &
a candlelit patina
covering
a thousand nights
spent ruining tablecloths
lovingly destroying
illusions
your every word brilliant
eyes alight
that saccharine fucking
Andrea Bocelli CD playing
on maddening repeat
my laughter too loud
for the intimate room
we were certainly doomed
our conversations
were always the wildest sex
i smiled remembering
into the fezziwig glow
of the old window
warmed by the fact
they still haven’t dusted
when
my ears perked alive
as suddenly crept
haunted sounds of
a minstrel show
a hand
strumming a guitar
your voice
in half notes
amidst sodium lamp motes
drawing me toward
that ancient apartment building
where you
serenaded me
I began to
swiftly seek
certain
I would find you
if only the source of the sound
was located
before the melody ended
rounding the corner
I found myself all alone
with weary dumpsters & brownstones
breathing clouds of longing
hair damp
with the scent
of dead pine wreaths
& recollection
because
truth be told
i miss my friend
so true without you
there will never again be
music for me
on the perpetually wet streets
of Clifton
if purgatory
is a soup kitchen line
in a catholic church
hell
is serving up grub
on the corner of 8th & vine
southern baptists
pulling up
in their tax exempt jesus wagon
to serve homeless people
hot chili in july
heaven, happens
in Cincinnati
when pigs fly
we were four madcaps deep
in a ratskeller bathroom stall
stoned
within boozy historic walls
one of us pissing
three of us smoking
all of us drinking
3 queens and a king holding court
in the men’s room shitter
gods were made
mushroom euphoric
k-hole bar bouncers lamented
upstairs Nagasaki
our glee
our group dynamic pee
a urinal patron
chimed in
with delighted confusion
so
my lips began
to recite a poem
summoned at will
about buying tickets to the show
spoken word,
nay,
spoken turd, i say
he laughed and applauded
on the other side
of our bomb shelter door
in that moment
we
truly lived
they had a wake
for aralee strange
in a bar
where university poets
showed up to behave
like academic sharks
sparring with street poet jets
i sat beside a man who was
a monolithic Jewish Poseidon professor
on a funeral date
wrong for me
i,
equally wrong for he
though it doesn’t keep me from missing him
weeping openly
in a room full of
a species of staue
films of her played
as her southern voice caused
candlelit
unbloomed lily buds
in table vases
to burst open
every night you were away
i sought you out
through blackberry bramble ether
from weeping constellations above dixmyth avenue
to jessamine county barns filled with horse hay
perpetually wrapping blue ribbon around my finger
whispering vespers
my plea to the particles of the universe
to hold you together
to bring you back from oblivion
as you had done for me
you are my chosen family
inextricably part
of my thunderous heart
to which you will always hold the latchkey