The shop still stands
There in my old neighborhood
Of endless, stately houses,
Neat lawns and
Velcroed binoculars
For the leering.
.
The same man still owns the shop
With eyes like splintered wooden blanks
That penetrate your benevolent intentions
And with high school female employees
Populating the premises like
Some off-colored rhododendrons
Out of season.
.
And that
Dark Horse
Fore Smoked Stout
Still
Sits on the shelves in there,
Rich, robust and with
Unmistakably rounded flavor,
A beer I’ve
.
Never
Been able to find
Anywhere else around.
.
And really,
I don’t need it.
.
There’s Bell’s Kalamazoo Stout,
There’s Old Rasputin,
There’s Budweiser,
For when pay day’s coming up.
.
But the Fore Smoked
Napalms on to my consciousness
Like the decadent curve of a
High school girl’s posterior,
.
Like the low,
Moribund, gurgling
Sound
.
That is this world
And that
.
Makes you squint
Or nervously chuckle,
As you change the channel.