D. B. Cox

the legend


barroom is smoky

he swears that he knows me

i lie, say "no way"

& move to a corner booth


where I sit & stare

into my bottle

like a gypsy fortune teller

trying to place the face…


high school badass

loved to fight

ate glass for breakfast

& pissed razor blades


drink you under the table

laughing too loud

forever looking

to make trouble his own


slow dancing

with the wrong woman

in the wrong bar

on the wrong side of town


around him, you were always

out on a limb --

slipping toward a night

in the drunk tank


hell yeah

numero uno

small-town desperado

a fucking local legend…


now --

a blast from the past

sunset in his eyes

bravado, decades gone


hard-earned stories

boring the hell

out of a young lady

hanging at the bar


clutching a baby-blue

cellphone,

like she's waiting on a call

from another time zone…




(Poem Brothers pulled because it has appeared on another zine



forever seventeen -

 

on parade

in the old man's

coupe deville

past the neon arcades

 

& curb service joints

strewn like endless options

along the friday-night

boulevard

 

an unchained soul,

liberated by a slick v8,

& a dollars worth

of high-test -

 

25 cents a goddamn gallon...

 

singing along

with the car radio;

the bobby fuller four -

"i fought the law, & the law won"

 

knowing if things get slow

there's an all-night

pool game down

at the crossroads

 

a grudge match --

"fountain inn red" versus

the "left hand of god" --

jimmy hodges

 

no cover charge…

 

or i could

just pack it in,

head home & watch

the twilight zone

 

the one where

gig young walks

back in time

to his old home town

 

& gets the bum's rush

from his own father…

 

yeah, just another

friday night

no hurry, no worry

like a rolling stone --

 

back when satisfaction

was a honky tonk

woman -- & time

was on my side…

 


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