Trigonis, John T.

English

The Open Repository @Binghamton (The ORB)

Harpur Palate: a Literary Journal Volume 7 Issue 2 Article 34 December 2008 Pale Imitation of a Rusty Old NIght Club Performer John T. Trigonis Follow this and additional works at: https://orb.binghamton.edu/harpurpalate Recommended Citation Trigonis, John T. (2008) "Pale Imitation of a Rusty Old NIght Club Performer," Harpur Palate: a Literary Journal: Vol. 7: Iss. 2, Article 34. Available at: https://orb.binghamton.edu/harpurpalate/vol7/iss2/34 This Poetry is brought to you for free and open access by The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB). It has been accepted for inclusion in Harpur Palate: a Literary Journal by an authorized editor of The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB). For more information, please contact ORB@binghamton.edu. PALE IMITATION OF A RusTY OLD NrGHT CLUB PERFORMER John T. Trigonis I play chis ragged piano every night, and every night you waltz away to the beat of another song, leave me scenting the scale surround for your fish-bone embrace. I become a paler imitation ofTom Waits, drunk and broken-souled, watching brokenhearted itineraries slow dance on shattered bottles of rusty Bud, each escorted by a crushed-smoke concerto filtering its memories into the ceiling fan of chis small, downtown night club ticking and tocking for a bridge that may never come. The rustled cheeks of loneliness, that sour milk taste of leftover jazz, open mic amnesia peacocking amidst the barflies and brooders; here, I remember each menchol-laced word you'd ever lie up against my coarse, matchbox heart. Yet chis piano is a ransomed Polaroid alibi tossed into the musical ashtray wasteland, lost, and all I can do is play for my soft, blue winter, switchblade romance; my sacrificial requiem, my blacked-out supermarket conversations (with no one in particular); my turbulent zooc-suic detective, half-eaten Joan of Arc; my wee dream on the edge of a razor; my dirty protection, wane of stability, of rekindled peace; chis, my one more encore performance invoking your sweet animus home for more and more of our old, replayable war. 107 1Trigonis: Pale Imitation of a Rusty Old NIght Club PerformerPublished by The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB), 2008

Pale Imitation of a Rusty Old NIght Club Performer

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Pale Imitation of a Rusty Old NIght Club Performer

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