heroin trombone

i wanna sleep at the bottom of false creek with the fish and crabs to kiss my toes i wanna sleep in false creek where i cant hear the blue winds blow sinking like a coffin ship all hands lost deep below they call it pain and waistings where i woke up this morn dirty clothes and shoes of blood alley roses of the overdose dawn they grow like flowers of sleeping blues shipwrecks of yellow flesh deserted castaways lonely in crowds of woe on the nod from white china doses down the street from my home just a breath away as cold winds chase herion sharks that swim in hunger circles here everyday salvation army coats passed out pidgeon park nervous tic overflow waiting in line for soup in the dark in the smoke of amphetamines fire their faces appear as lighters flicker their corpse skins blue as the electric wire theyd wrap around yr skin for just one match of powdered fire to feed the demons laughing deep within down the street from my hotel where i write of these liars to keep out the cold and burn all these hearts like typerwriter coal and dream of the ocean soul where mermaids play trombones to announce my words as true and so with mermaid jazz let truth and madness here conspire i live at the chelsea up the stairs next to the cornershop that sells smokes and bags of junk from a coat behind the lollypops next door is funkywinkerbean's where theyll squeeze you beer from a rag for a measley dime or a smile for the hag queen mushroom drunks that grow here steady like slime trying to sell you bags of skunk they come in desperation their sex their crime and get fucked like a ragdoll here everytime you could cut them down with a knife or hack through them with a stainless steele machete they come to you smelling of mold sucking soft flesh like spaghetti they come here every night begging please please please the floor keeps them from falling down as the grovel at yr knees later tonight it starts again mardi gras every month tonight everyone is a millionaire drinks flow for every drunk but i sit with an empty glass and crushed beercan for a stare in the same room ive always been behind the poker lounge on hastings where the russian sailors all got skinned i sit here thinking this and that seeing letters in my head typing black someone came up behind me taps my shoulder and starts to laugh i turned around to see her face light up in the flame of a match the xylophones clinked like the ice in her drink i swear her make up had been on for a year her liquor loose laughter of jellyfish face could not hide her tracks of mascara tears her black dress was nothing but smoke so i lean in and listened to her swear as a cigarette dangled from her toothless lear these very words to my ear more words than i deserve more words than i can bare just now down the street ill swear on anything holy sacred or old i saw him under that neon pig that throws down dollar signs of red and gold where the reggae preacher sings with his dog all night in the lonely cold i just met artur rimbaud he had marzipan eyes like holes eyes heavy lids half closed since eleven he blew his blues that day all day since seven he played jazz notes with a suicide smile on a old heroin trombone dented from all the miles brass like an ornamental bone he thought he had all figured out he planted poppies in a row all he had to do was blow away his time solo horns till they grow they found him on pain and waistings where the end of all melodies flow he never got his trombone out it hung from his lips kind of blue and cold like the tips of his fingers still holding the note still squeezing that beat up horn he came to the end of his song he had nowhere to go his last breath blown the chords lay silent in death rapture solo just like the day before just another song of syncopated woe tommorrow tommorrow and the days after that there will always be more jazz ends with no wind to blow now zig zags roll my soul i hear him like an echo his old trombone blows like a foghorn warning of rocks along the shore i feel like im on a sinking ship but i have nowhere to go i wanna sleep at the bottom of false creek with the fishes of old rimbaud down here deep and dark i cant hear his solo or feel the wind of his notes i want to sleep in false creek oh baby please never let me go... Written March 7th, 2002 © on Mar 07 2002 11:12 AM PST   17 • 0 • 1