Listening to “Desolation Row” in Back of Jim’s Car on the Way to Bar in Buffalo

Again, I’m tangled in my own uncut hair, too drunk to dice the differences between “desolation” and “decision.” They might be homonyms.

Outside a convenience store, a man has been shot; a Samaritan’s coat covers his torso. The shot man’s legs twitch and his feet kick as the ambulance approaches in a holy glow of red lights.

Jim describes the place we’re going to as “ironically seedy,” a cesspool of hipsters. “The artistes stand at the bar and pose like basement mannequins,” he says. Jim is a painter; I’m a poet. What are we doing?

Bob Dylan sold out, eventually.

A man is dying, his head resting on a curb.

I can’t stop drinking.

Men with Mustaches

A man with a mustache must be watched closely,
like a storm cloud concealing lighting in its coat.

A man with a mustache might be a porn star,
a scrawny guy with three legs sweating pools of fuck.

A man with a mustache might sell you a used car
and promise it will change the way you drive. It will.

A man with a mustache might wear his shirt unbuttoned,
his chest hair screaming like a room full of pop-fans.

A man with a mustache might sell tickets
for The Ferris wheel, piss behind the dunking booth.

A man with a mustache might try to write like Hemingway
but only succeed in drinking himself to sleep.

A man with a mustache might, in fact, be me
before I shaved it off after scaring myself in the mirror.

A man with a mustache must be watched closely:
I guarantee he’s looking at you, chewing on a toothpick.

Nathan Graziano resides in Manchester, New Hampshire with his wife Liz and two children. He teaches English at The Pembroke Academy. His work has been published widely to include a collection of fiction, a full length collection of poetry and seven chapbooks. Nathan can be found at www.nathangraziano.com.