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Monday
December 18, 2000

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desert memory by david

I was at the Buck taking pictures with my notebook when David
joined me at the center table and we started trading poems
on topics we assigned one another. His entries were hard to read.

motorcycle helmet rack
by the door
the bartender slams
the pen down
on the counter
without a word
i should never
have said please
when i asked to
borrow it
with just a few
lined pages left
in this little black
and red notebook .
in walks that guy
from Alien Crime
Syndicate
(i recognize
the sideburns from a
picture i saw in the paper
a year or so ago,
maybe more) he works
at Sonic Boom new
& used record store.
the woman he's meeting
who'd been sitting alone
at the end of the bar
is confident,
has sass in her step
on her way to the toilet
to freshen up.
he waits behind
big eyeglasses
reading The Stranger,
chin propped on hand,
fingers downturned,
elbow on the bar...
when i'm interrupted
by a grey limping man
a student of Frost
his favorite was Pound
first memory was rocket
scientist father who said,
"Watch out for rattlers,"
when the boy was 4,
Alamogordo, NM, 1944.
he lost his virginity
to a Eugene cheerleader
who seduced him at 17
when Ike was president.
"I'm mafia," he said, "I know
where the bodies are. If
you ever need a job, call John..."
he pushed the coverless
International pocket Bible
across the table
with a number in Everett
written below the title.
in the end i gave him
a handful of quarters
(all i had) so he could
buy one last Rainier
to drink by himself.
he'd gotten off
at the wrong stop,
had never been in the Buck
before. he shuffled off
to the toilet and I left,
so unlike me not to hang
in until last call.