COME SIT BY THE FIRESIDE


Rosehill Cemetery gates across the street

barroom, front patio, back patio, dining room

one bar back. Career alcoholics,

a sea of pony and half barrel kegs

lining the floors of the basement

change the sanke, wrench the nozzle, Co2 tanks

hissing beer pouring from brass taps

pint glasses sweating in the heat

bouncing, Latin Kings smashing bar stools

on my back, people stomping on heads

on the sidewalk

shot glasses thrown in my face, pint glasses

coworkers fucking each other in the bathroom

biker lady wielding a Billy club at my head

ex-girlfriend crashes my van out front

CPD extorts me for four hundred dollars

run to the 24-hour Jewel to grab cash from the ATM

homicide detectives next to drug dealers next to

Pakistani cab drivers and service industry regulars

and sex workers, cockroaches crawling out of our food

they are in my clothes, fall of the ceiling into my hair

I ladle one out of the ranch dressing, one crawls out of my salad

Juan fucks up and is attacked by a woman clicking a taser

Tommy scales the wall to break in and cooks himself breakfast

and is knocked out with a punch to the face

then scales the wall and does it again

my Tai boss takes me from my shift in the middle of the night

to bring me to her Lady Boy Show in a closed off

Tai restaurant in an empty neighborhood

people are slipping twenties into thongs while the

Lady boys dance seductively and sing karaoke

7 AM, we are shotgunning Strongbow in the parking lot while

cyclists go by to start their day

boxes fall over int the beer cooler, our glug wine container

is filled with trash, spit, and germs, and we microwave

it and serve it to customers

a terrible man asks me to phone him a cab to Rogers Park

I send him to 95th and Halsted, his wife is in the hospital dying

and he is here hitting on 21-year-old girls. Leaving,

a coyote follows me down the street by the train tracks

the street is covered in mist, unseen birds singing.

I walk a mile home

in silence.