being half-young I sat about the bars
slurping it up to the ears
thinking something might happen to
me, I mean, I tried the ladies:
"hey, baby, listen, the costermongers
weep for your beauty..."
or some such.

their heads never turned, they looked
ahead, straight ahead,
bored.

"hey, baby, listen, I am a
genius, haha ha..."

silent before the bar mirror, these
magic creatures, these secret sirens,
big-legged, bursting out of their
dresses, wearing shining dagger
heels, earrings, strawberry mouths,
just sitting there, sitting there,
sitting there.

one of them told me, "you bore
me."

"no, baby, you got it
backwards..."

"oh, shut up..."

then in would walk the dandy, some fellow
neat in a suit, pencil mustache, bow tie;
he would be slim, light, musical, delicate
and so knowing
and all the ladies would start calling his
name: "oh, Murray, Murray!"
or some such.

"hi, girls!"

I always knew I could deck one of those
fuckers but that hardly mattered in the
sum total of things,
the ladies just gathered about Murray
(or some such) and I just kept ordering
drinks,
sharing the juke music with them
and listening to the laughter from
the inside jokes
that I couldn't quite
hear.

I wondered what wonderful things
I was missing, the secret of the
magic, something that they knew,
and I felt myself again the idiot in the
schoolyard, sometimes a man never got out
of there--he was marked, it could be told
with a mere glance

and so
I was shut out,
"I am the lost face of
Janus," I might say through some
momentary silence.
of course, to be
ignored.

they'd pile out
to cars in back parking
smoking
laughing
to drive off
to some consumate
ever-victory

leaving me
to keep on drinking
just me
sitting there
then the face of the
bartender near
mine:

"LAST CALL!"

his meaty indifferent face
cheap in the cheap
light

to have my last drink
go out to my ten year old car
at the curbing
get in
to drive ever so carefully
to my rented
room