right leg crosses left, outside
she's taking out the trash

my window can't be
more private

i see her close the door
and that's when i
lower the zipper

when I got to the bar
there was an old bird sitting
by the window

she was sitting inside of
a blue dress
that had seen better days

"you're too good to sit by me?"
she asked

"not too good," I said,
and moved my drink
to her table

she placed a long, brown cigarette
between her lips

"you got a light?"

i felt around.

"I have smokes, but no light."

"typical," she said.

I got up and found the bartender.
"you have any matches?"

"watch out for that one," he said.
"she turns men into suicides."

I took the matches back
to our table

"here ya go," as I lit one with her.

she sucked in the smoke.
as she exhaled, she said
"do you know what's wrong with
the world?"

"sometimes, I think I get pretty
close,"

"Men." is all she says.

"at least we're good for a light, right?"

she scratched something on her wrist for a minute,
then turned to me and said
"you are killing us."

she wanted fried chicken

I knew where to get it at that hour, but she didn't want to walk the six blocks

at that hour.

"I'm drunk as shit," I told her

"you're always this drunk. what's the big deal?" she asked

"why don't You drive."

"I can't drive that piece of shit, Chinaski. the gears stick."

"okay," I said. "I'll drive. but we might die for this chicken."

"fuck it. let's go. you get to the track more drunk than this.

I need some fried chicken."

"here we go then," I said. putting it

all on the line.

it was christmas time,
and a good day at the track

i came home with 3 bottles
and she had not moved from the bed
for 10 hours

"they turned off the water," she said,
moving a pillow beneath her back

i looked at the bottles,
thinking about water and the
money i no longer had

"i gotta shit," i said, and looked for a bag
and the trash pail

i tied it up nice and tight and
got back in the car

driving around the neighborhood,
i found a house
with a huge work of christmas lights on the roof
spelling the name: JESUS

i threw the bag onto their lawn and
never looked back

it was a line for a cheeseburger, and you would think that'd be a simple affair.

he recognized my face from somewhere. "CHINASKI, I KNOW IT'S YOU, I SEEN YOUR PICTURE IN THE MAGAZINE."

he wanted love. I tried it through my words, but he wanted more.

"yes, yes. Hello," I said.

"I'VE GOT THIS WOMAN WHO DOES NOT UNDERSTAND MY DRINKING," he rattled.

I considered it. "you are either not choosing women correctly, or you are not drinking correctly. mostly, I'm interested in a cheeseburger. okay?"

"HHAHA you are so FUNNY Chinaski. So what should I do?! You are like the master of this kinda crap."

"start by leaving me alone," I said. "that's a perfect start."

the cheeseburger ended up not being worth this.

I left, but I did sign his shirt before I went to McDonald's.

this shit never seems to happen at McDonald's.

I thought I had seen the end of her. But when I came home from the gig she was sitting on the curb in front of my house. What the shit, I thought. I asked my driver to stick around for a few minutes. I was afraid.

"Baby, I’m not drunk enough for this," I said.

"Hank, you fuck. I have to spy on you now?"

I had no idea what she was talking about. When she saw the look on my face, she said "Oh my god, you idiot. You promised me."

After I gently moved my body toward hers and explained my amnesia, we sat down together with the chuga chug of the cab in front of us. Apparently I had made a promise to be at her son’s birthday party, 3 days prior. When she let go of her anger there were refrigerator magnets in her eyes, you know? With the funny captions by chicken wings?

"You know, that agreement lives in a bottle where..." I got lost... "we're not fancy?" I said.

"FUCK YOU CHINASKI," is the last I ever heard from her.

I actually did like her kid. He looked at me with eyes that see bullshit.

it was one of those afternoons
I woke up with a small piece of paper taped
to my forehead

it said:
"Friend, don't forget the love right now."

I didn't know it was there
until I was in the bathroom
trying to
guzzle enough water to
drown a fish

I peeled it off and
stuck it on the mirror

and got back in
bed.

there was a time when I
wasn't alone

when sometimes, the mail would
make its way onto my counter
without me

when I needed to make stops
on the way back
from the track
for things that would not
belong to me

when blankets were pulled up
and over me
by gentle hands
that smelled like soap

when being at home for the telephone
was decided by
a simple glance
and not just the razor blades
of last night's bottle

millions of us
live and die
alone

always
remembering a time
when we
were not

I had found a way to not be involved
a way to have nothing to pin to the refrigerator
with magnets, or much to say
thank you for

neatly packaging the trash
and cutting my food into square
pieces

digesting by appointment

for months I went to bed with an open window
the sound of life squeeking like vermin
through worn brake pads and
bottles blasting off the walls

it was too much

it all comes down to a
wet heartbeat, pushing through
early morning nights

liquid smashing against the
muscle

I claw at the greasy hair on my chest
and remember a girl named Tammy,
stare sideways at the cardboard house
and a stain near the bottom
of the fridge

the heart is shackled
and limping
losing its bet with surrender

the little man
in a neat blue suit
standing straight inside
the squeeky box
above my dresser

you're still on the air? I think.

I asked the girl at the museum
to pick a random place
on the map

and that's where I went

they were shitting in alleyways
drinking from rivers

the bars weren't bars, they were
pissholes with warm food

I sat and thought about Los Angeles
Linda's legs coming in full focus

and realized that

no matter how bad they had it
I had it worse for her

I walked along the morning market
bought fruit and Polish vodka

I met a drunk who had good meat

we cooked it on my balcony
and I told him my story

"you're all washed up" he said
"you sold your soul to a woman."

I cut into the steak and put it in my mouth

"This life is for dying" I chewed
and he toasted me
"Dying to live Chinaski - dying to live."

in the morning he was spent,
folded in half before the dying fire

I put on his shoes, I don't know why
they were too big - but comfortable

I found the beach and walked along the shore
an ocean and a language away from home

and I threw his shoes out to sea

there wasn't anything left to do but
screw open the bottle

I had pummeled myself against the
dark waters
I had waited in lines full of bums
like a gentleman

I spent 6 weeks dry
courting the attention of
one beauty

only to find her sipping whiskey at the bar
with my landlord

he was a handsome man, and
well to do

they must have met while I was at work


six weeks wasted then, but the
rent was paid


I pushed so much paper,
pushed so many socks into socks

I carefully stacked the TV dinners
into the freezer
spine-up, like a menu

I actually washed between my toes
and bought a new mattress

I read more than the front page,
learned the name of our mayor

carefully wrote out the check for the lights
when the bill arrived

"I just can't stand men who drink," she'd said.

and as I stared at her through the bar's window,
drinking round after round with him,
I began to see the image of my own face
in the glass.

and there was nothing left to do.

I came down around the time
she came home

her hair was a mess from
nervous habits with
greasy fingers,
the diner's smell rising
from her socks

I THOUGHT I ASKED YOU TO CLEAN THIS BATHROOM she says...

I run my thumb across her chin, and
suck on the thumb a bit...everything tastes different
off a woman's skin

"you know I pay the bills here baby" I say,
and she goes into the bathroom

while she's gone I smell the armpits of her jacket
slam the fridge and sit down,
throwing another cap into the
fireplace

the light shimmering
before the eye of
the fly

first they waited six months
next to buckled fences and
broken-down cars

they looked frightened and thin,
abiding the law,
scrawny gargoyles on
crumbling brick

after their paperwork came through
they started showing off a few words,
throwing food into bags and
sweeping the walkways

I try to learn their names as I
look in their eyes,
eyes sharp and bright
with hope and caution

and it's a god damn delight
to raise my drink to
good men again
at the bar

fathers, who swindled mountains
out of clouds,
sucked oceans
through a straw

and spend their days
holding the
tiny hand
they found in
the morning

it's all over,
now, that it's
just begun

the line stretches out
into the distance
where

fire is bursting
out of ice
lies are becoming
truths
and flies swirl
around the light of
the next idea

the world gets down
on one knee
like a boxer engaged
by the bell

he drops
keeping one hand gripped
on the rope

watching his blood
fall
staining the canvas
beneath him

he feels the pounding
of his enemy
send tremors
through the ring
that contains them

and

a moment tears open
its yawning abyss
engulfing the boxer
in a stupor
of clarity

and he

says a
prayer

for
his
ass

it's not easy to swing from the vines
when the trees are filled with
chimpanzees

my computer stopped working
a couple of days ago

I pounded it with my fists
and screamed

I called it terrible things
and the people who made it
terrible things
and the creature that made
all of these
terrible things
terrible things

I drank more than usual
and cried, oh yes,
I cried

I looked longingly back at
simpler times

thought of
candles, firewood, warmth
prime time filled with real Love
in the house but
outside of a box

I remembered being a child
within the perimeter of adult eyes

adults who worked hard
to ward away
evil things
from their home

I thought of these things and
let them
carry me away to
sleep

and as I
drifted awake
the next morning,
the windows were open
and I could hear the
children playing

and a huge beam of light
was shooting through the east wall
right onto my computer

when I saw it like that
it did not seem so bad

so I got up off the bed
and walked toward it
with a huge sunbeam
warming my back

I walked into an old bar tonight
and when I did
this crowd of young people
cheered from the corner

"HELLO CHINASKI" they cried.
"mmm. hello," I said.

"WE LOVE YOUR WORK CHINASKI
CAN WE BUY YOU A DRINK" they cried.
"you can buy all of them," I said.

this involved sitting in their
general proximity,
which I must say:
was not the best place
to be

their minds were like
peanut butter;
rich with protein but
so slow off the
tongue

I spent hours ordering
the best Scotch and beer the
bar had in stock,
imagining their fathers,
footing the bill,
asleep and in wait
of the morning roll call

I grasped another
chilly bottle,
forgetting that
madness

and the hours flipped
forward,
and forward,

until finally,
my fan club began
taking turns vomiting
in the john

soon after that,
they had all
piled into cabs after
clumsily stuffing
my signature
into their
denim pockets

and when all was quiet,
I looked up to see

a lot of brothers and sisters

looking at
me

from the creaking stools
of an old bar
tonight

I woke up with the typer
pressed into my face

grabbed the last beer and
it was all right

~

she walked around my room

bare feet pressed into my
next book

"what is this, Chinaski?
your room makes me sick.
all these papers
on the floor."

I watched those pages curl
between her toes and thought:

'that's my next book, right there.
those feet are curing the book.'

and you are reading it.

"why don't you leave me to write," I'd say
and she would, she would
leave me to stay and
write

the kids roll by my house
in their lowered cars

their bass tubes shaking my drink
and rattling my windows

as if declaring,
"OUR HEARTBEATS ARE STRONG,
OUR HEARTS ARE FILLED WITH
LUST AND POWER."
"WE HAVE ARRIVED,
DO NOT IGNORE US."

and I've noticed that
the louder their stereos are,
the slower they drive

today was
one of those days
down at the track

every horse seemed to be
running against me

and after each loss,
as I'd sit and
turn a page in my notebook
in growing despair,
some large man nearby
would be cheering

and it always seemed to be
the same man

I'd think about that
about how I could get that magic
a little closer to me

later on I saw him at the concession stand
where we'd all spend the time between races
giving back our winnings
or what we needed to win

and I bought him a coffee

he said, "thanks brother, what's this for?"
"because today it's yours, baby. today is all yours."

it felt right.
there was a glimmer in his eye,
and he thanked me.

I walked back to my seat
staring at the Form, looking for
my next angle.
and something had changed.

I think I brought it
a little closer