To Elton John’s Ear: Philadelphia (Freedom)

WRTI is taking requests, Sir John
All night, it’ll go all night; is it Sir?
Or Lord I wonder? Not one call tonight
A trembling note in the girl’s voice: “requests?”

A frequency to that tremble, I think
Viscous, unpredictable and human
Carried on electromagnetic waves

Mr. John – or Sir : “The El Train,” a poem
By me, The Lord Night Owl, permit me this:
Ahh, heh, heh, hem… pentameter hem… hem:
Oh snarky reverie did call my name
On a couch in Center City, sipping gin
The tonic flat, but limes and Bombay

And we did listen to your song, Elton
Our city a full five syllables sung
“Shine the light, shine the light, won’t you shine…”
Tribesman’s dances ensued: “the light,” indeed

There is something pleading in that “won’t you”
Have you been to Philadelphia, El?
You got it right, the city and the me
For I am always singing, “Shine The Light!”
And just a little lower, “Shine The Light”
Then higher like the first time, “Shine The Light!”
Highest of all, quivering in my throat:
“Won’t You Shine Already Motherfucker?”
On the el train or the Night Owl, because
the el train will become the Night Owl
Every night at twelve-thirty: go all night
Sixty-ninth to Frankford, Sir John, have you been?
At the stop and drunk on gin, wistfully
recalling limes and forgetting the tonic

But not ahead, El; first you must walk, sir
With me: Witching Hour through Washington Square
Ringing in my heart and the tower bells
And the slow fade, uniform stumbling gait
of fourteen-thousand feet toward the bar

Men lying on benches turn, sniff the air
That bastard demon clawing in their chest
“No, not for you, last call and not a nickel”
“But shine, won’t you shine,” they are requesting
To whom do they ask? Not to each other
No, not to the bastard demon either
But tell me, who are they pleading with, El?

And after the Square, west to Little Pete’s
Cause I’m drunk, Elton, and you wrote the song
And now you shall know the meaning of it
But also for American cheese omelets

Say it with me, El, American flat:
“Every sandwich has a mug shot in this joint”
Hard flash, caught-in-the-act photography
Point to it, there, own up to your dinner
Don’t look and it costs you sixty cents, fair
Pay the gal: tabloid, and read it backwards

The sports page is always singing: “Dominate”
Then just a little lower: “dominate”
And higher like the first: “Dominate”
“Domination!” Every fucking graph, El
From their cue-ball heads to the withering heart
And yesterday it was every page only
When it gets to every sentence: Portland
Yes, I will pack up my kerchief and stick

But hold, consider the waitress’ shuffle
Two a.m., far different than four o’clock
in the afternoon; Six a.m., you ask?
You don’t want to know, El, just leave that be
All night, she goes all night every single…
American flat, there, listen for it:

A gasket in her heart since ninety-two
Her daughters cried and sighed when read the news
Nine fillings, the first one in fifty-eight
When she lamented her growing pear shape
Though now she laments the lamenting hours

And some nights while on break or in the can
She hears WRTI whisper faint
Between the gasket and the nine fillings
Tremor of electromagnetic waves
An unseen hungry voice to her ear: “requests?”

Finish up, more drunkards waiting, don’t sip
To The Owl and quick; you want the next, El
Never the after; there is a rhythm:

That guides you past the toothless men, their hands
Same texture as the sidewalk, but a smile
That holds you mid-stumble, no, let it pass
Empty Duncin’ Donuts cup, bone fingers
Extended to you: “Won’t you shine the light?”

Beast approaches, roar, forty souls within

So step up, token or transfer or none
For Jonah notices little at the helm
His eyes a pair of distant moons shining
at the parallel yellow, “will they meet?”
He has thought on some nights, this included
“If I go all night, sixty-ninth to Frankford…”

Keeps him upright this, toes nuzzle the gas
For the Night Owl traces the el, Elton
Empty tracks above await a decent hour
The clean-shaven they will carry at daybreak
But we, no, we are not held aloft thus
Empty tracks over, won’t you shine the light?

“No, nay, nay,” I believe is their comment
I have heard it, particularly
on cold nights, “No, nay, nay,” the wind howls through
“In the hollow belly you must ride”
Its blue steel, ribs of the leviathan

Janitor and drunkard and bum, packed in
Look, the man there, the Philadelphian
There, his hair has not been washed in two years
Has ridden from sixty-ninth; he’ll go all night
Warmth of the Owl, of the Leviathan
He’s humming unconscious through a toothless gape:
“We, Philadelphia, we, Elton
Listen: all your children sobbing for light”

Pull the string, Elton, you have seen enough
No, nay, nay, liar, I have seen enough
And I am not a musician, no flute
I have not the skill to sing it out, El
Goddamnit, this here, ringing in my heart
and the tower bells: “Won’t you shine the light?”
But only electromagnetic waves to
carry it to me; Pull the string, Elton
York-Dauphin, we shall walk, head down, collar up

Blanket in the closet, the couch pulls out
Sorry for the snub, mate, but you have left me cold

Alone I wish to open the window tall
Lay shirtless on top of the wrinkled sheets
The air through the screen, flip on the transistor
A man blows against a sliver of wood
It whispers soft, through a coiling of tin
Churning of the electromagnetic
Carries it to me, yes, to my bare chest
I want the tower bells to join; I know
the ringing in my heart will match his phrase

And to the north I can hear, already
The first of the el roaring out the dawn

In the alley the waitress crouches low
Next to the dumpster, guarding her spark
against the wind, getting the Marlboro lit
But she stops, can hear something distant
She is still, sniffing the air: “what is that?”

My eyes pleading upward through the screen
At the slow brightening dawn of the day
The girl’s voice arrives for the last tonight
She went all night: Coltrane to Bootsie Barnes

The waitress stands up straight in the darkness
The voice is not afar, though it whispers faint
Resonating soft from the heaving breast
Between the gasket and the nine fillings:
“Requests?”

Friday Night Blazer

it is autumn tonight in Philadelphia
cool air through the screen
first time all year
the chained dog’s bark on the air
short and sharp, and get on with his chow
but the unleashed howl, they howl in long desperate pleas:
“Cast ooooff, Cast ooooooff,” at the city night
as the hull beckons the keel, as the sternum beckons the sailor
luminous skyline to the south, empty dark above
“Cast ooooooofffff, Cast ooooffff,” for there is no hope
and that is the trick
let me greet the cool night air
as the sixty-year-old South Philly bachelor
tonight, his Friday night blazer
alone, no hope, but that a younger woman may brush his hand
flip her hair, reveal her neck
now there it is
his hair slicked to the scalp with lubricant
slick it back, slick it back, reveal
no need to hide the lines
slick it back, slick it back
“my face is here,” he says with repeated strokes of the comb
“and here is a scar, and here is a deep line
follow them, dear, with your soft finger there”
Cast off, Cast off
“for I am the old, the dark, these things unknown to you:
the cool air of this city, a vicious howl on it
is there not redemption here?”
but instead alone I sit tonight
snuggling up to a dictionary
my rosary beads are the bookmark