God Bless

On the corner of Nineteenth Avenue and Indian School
I watched a whore flip a cigarette into oncoming traffic.
A silver SUV jumped the curb
ran over a bum holding a God Bless You sign.
I watched it happen
while I gassed up my cab
at three thirty AM.
It was tragic
and kind of funny at the same time.
More tragic
than funny
but watching the whore run down the ally
made me laugh.
I have to admit.
The police showed up,
the driver of the SUV looked scared
and kept pointing in the direction
the whore ran.
An ambulance loaded the bum and took off.
Another whore walked up to me and said whew.
I agreed.
Do you want some company? She asked.

Chasing Ghosts Through the Biggest One Horse Town in the World

She was wearing a fur coat
Her tits were almost falling out of her shirt
I thought about asking her if she was cold
The guy she was traveling with handed me a five for a four ninety five ride
She looked at him like is that all you have
He told her he needed some ones
She told me to give her the five gave me a twenty
Asked for a ten
When she got out of the cab I noticed she had a great ass

Acorns

We lived together a long time ago
Not under the same roof
We shared a hill creeks and woods and ponds and corn fields
Climbed trees rode bikes and sleds
Played kick the can capture the flag football and baseball and basketball
In each others yards and vacant lots
We all dreamed of glory none of us achieved
Nothing lasts or stays the same
Everyone goes their own way I went all the way to Arizona
The years run together
Gone before we knew it
I almost forgot Most of what happened
Everything mattered whether it did or not
The games we played defined us The friends we made were meaningless
No matter how much we needed them
They were replaceable
Not missed much
Barely remembered except the betrayals
The dogs the paths the forts Coffee cans full of acorns to throw

War Movies

I was making lists in my head

five best war movies

Black Hawk Down
We Were Soilders
Apocalypse Now
Platoon
Gardens of Stone

and that made me remember watching Apocalypse Now
with my buddies
at Waddle's house
he called himself Daddy D
he fancied himself a drill Sargeant
even though he was a mediorce soilder
he almost broke his leg trying to make a standing landing
when we hitched a ride on a special forces airplane
that was pretty funny
I wonder what he's up to
his wife was pretty and stupid
he dumped her
I bet he's married to a pig now
and supports Donald Trump
who is inching his way twoards the presidency
and that is as scary as it seems somehow inevitable

I hate it when people miss use words like Nazi
and protest stuff before they happen
however Trump does have more in coman with Hitler
than the presidents in the Black Hills

I love the Black Hills
I want to take my daughter up there this summer
and also to Wounded Knee
and Little Bighorn
I hear there's ghosts there and that you can almost here them
in the wind

Car Accident

One of the first friends I made in Arizona died in a car crash on a Friday night in the spring of 1977. His name was Pat and we shared a table in art class with a cheerful chubby Mexican kid. School was almost out for the summer and I thought that made it slightly more tragic. I remember sitting at the table on Monday morning and asking the Mexican kid (I don't remember his name) Where's Pat? He said, he died. I couldn't believe that so I probably said something stupid like are you sure? Miss Brown are teacher was crying. Pat was a nice kid and a fair artist so she had kind of taken him under her wing. How did he die? I came around to asking and the Mexican kid told me that it was a car accident. The car flipped, he said Pat was in the passenger seat and he was the only one that even got hurt, he added and sighed. Fuck, I said, were they drunk? I asked. He shrugged. It don't matter anyway, I said. Miss Brown came to our table and asked if we were alright. We said that we were although the Mexican kid said, don't expect much out of me today. She was a mess and I should have asked if she was OK. I didn't know Pat that well. I moved to Arizona in the middle of the school year so I hadn't known him long either. He liked getting high and drawing dragons. He loved rock and roll music. He had long blond hair. He was skinny. He made people feel comfortable. Kids shouldn't die when they are in high school. Art class for the rest of the year was pretty somber and that was inevitable. I haven't thought about this in over thirty years. If I hadn't thought about it tonight I wonder if I ever would have thought about it again. .