As if Dancing to Basie

Warm beer and rosary beads,
clutched for nothing but comfort.
This knotted man is undone.
 
Nightly.
 
He two 
       steps
           the boardwalk

as if dancing to Basie.
Memories thrum his head-
a persistent moth

      that finally
                settles 
       on a back bicycle wheel.

A flicked Babe
Ruth baseball card.

*

The road melt day of 1962.
Riding with Stephen Chambers
to the lighthouse and beyond.
 
Jesus Christ
he was something
wasn’t he?
 
Legs of muscle,
soft cinnamon kisses.
A rock-solid knee trembler
aching to be a man
of his time.

They come,
they go.

Denim and dimes.

*
Now the bruised 
mist shrouds heavy.
Muffling the rollercoaster,
pulling a tarp over the day.
 
He falls asleep
on blown popcorn
and dreams cheaply
of America.
 
Of Stephen escaping
to Mexico City.