The bar squats at the bend in the road where Mill becomes Burden,
Walls somewhat recently painted,
Roof re-shingled ostensibly within memory
A derelict stockade on a front line where cowboy and Indian alike
Have each thought better of standing their ground,
Now defended by a few solitary souls,
Veterans of the days when the place hummed with those
Who’d finished shifts at Troy-Bilt or the Freihofer bakery
(Places either long gone or in the hospice stage,
The bar itself not profitable in any sense of the word,
Opening each afternoon for no palpable reason
Save some madness of inertia)
And who had not moved in with children in Latham or Malta,
Or gone to some frowzy, weedy southern trailer park
Sweating and sweltering through ninety-degree dawns
In Sarasota or St. Pete.
One corner of the building still bears a neon sign
Which sternly announces Ladies Entrance
Though, as the resident wits are fond of noting
Ain’t been no lady on the premises ‘n a month of Sundays,
But, on this particular evening, there is one of that gender
Haphazardly arranging herself on a stool
In search of a compromise between physical comfort
And simply remaining somewhat upright.
She is there in the company of a squat, *****-handed man
Who sits beside her, leering and yakking away
As he signals the bored and ancient bartender
For a couple more Buddy long-necks
(She cannot remember his name—Clyde, Clete,
In any case she’ll assign him an identity later.)
Their acquaintance is of a recent nature,
His end of the deal a burger at the diner on First Street
And a drink or two or three here
(There is a return on his investment, implicit and fully understood,
Though she has not—in her mind, anyway—reached such a point
As it needs to spelled out in plain English.)
She clutches, tightly though surreptitiously as possible,
For she occupies a social stratum
Where placing a death grip on something
Marks it as valuable, putting a bulls-eye
On object and owner as well,
A purse, a three-hundred dollar Coach bag
Bestowed on her by some gum-chomping Russell Sage undergrad
In a random, futile, wholly absurd gesture
(This was some time ago, and the bag, once a fiery crimson
Has faded and the fine leather has creased and mottled
Until it now appears to be a miniature strawberry heifer on a strap)
Though she would note that she was a family of some substance,
Having once attended a fine all-girls school
Where she became engaged
To a professor in the Fine Arts department
(It is unclear whether it was Smith or Bryn Mawr
Or, perhaps, Sarah Lawrence, if anywhere at all,
Her suitors and specters
All but indistinguishable from one another.)
All that, however, is clearly a matter of was;
Her will be is a less fanciful thing,
A measured yet inevitable and precipitous slide
into transactions less palatable
Exchanged for comforts colder than such as she settles for now
(But perhaps not—there is a persistent, palpable pain in her side
Accompanied by a noticeable swelling; Probably benign,
The nurse practitioner had noted at the free clinic,
But she occupied that societal niche
Where further, if unheroic, measures
Were unlikely to be forthcoming.)
In any case, she and her paramour pro tempore
Will call it a night, she pinning her bag to her side
As she instinctively swivels her head to and fro
To ensure no one is seeking to relieve her of her prize possession
(Though its contents are meager—a few dollars in change,
A sweater, a change of underwear,
The whole blessedly insubstantial,
As it is likely she could shoulder any additional load.)