Daughter of The Crescent City
Poem by: RexMundi555'.-
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Daughter of the Crescent City
By Alexander Guinevere Kern
Copyright 1986
You are my Paradox, Bourbon Street!
Humid, sultry air rubs my shoulders,
Sinuous yellow light leaks
Under the varnished doors of bars,
pools in the gutter.
Jazz strains emit - dimming, now blaring
As bar doors smack open and shut
Their Darkened mouths. The street unfurls
A cobblestone tongue. Tourists - we trespass
the plain text of active corruption.
But I've seen it all before. I'm from Baltimore.
From every crevice the sound of vice escapes.
Chimneys harbor specters of pirate's old treacheries,
Chuff columns of perfidy skyward in code.
I pretend it is only smoke and not
The baking Souls of Antique Secrets.
Steps sprout old men, chins grizzly gray
Stale Kings of Chaos, eyes watering, whiskey-pouring pores,
Potent tobacco plumes up, aromatic as mince. They speak
In tongues of no religious nature. Local Wildlife.
They have forgotten desire, its fire.
You can't beat the sterling prices,
Or the haunted incense of Voodoo Queen candles.
I was carried, kicking, by a balloon-twisting Pirreoux,
Garish, Green & Orange plastic Mardi Gras bijoux,
I looked anorectic and hungry.
They tell you "Don't wander down Burgundy Street."
All drugs, thugs and tarts, illegal necessities,
Forked up like Spring Lotus and everywhere awful
With Balcony screamers, streaked needles, stripped streakers.
"Seen it all before, Girl. I'm from Baltimore."
Hand me my French Market java and Harlequinade,
Beignets folded napkin warm, my powdered sugar shock,
Tomato Festival jolly and jammed. Damned Vampire standing
Cheek to neck to jaw: the color red they're looking for
Is not for sale in those fruit stalls.
I've seen it all before. I'm from Baltimore.
Stroll by a late Waker, pissing up a wall,
I said, "Say, son, be moving! Cops is rolling in!"
He didn't hear me - all Four Eyes Blind. The Street
Is wet with metaphors, New Orleans Navigator,
Slipping in and out like the ships!
In Jackson Square a charcoal artist renders Moi,
A tanned Hard Hat Tomboy, for that is what I am,
Wife-beater T-shirt, clanking crosses, Gypsy jewels,
He sketched my Ambiguous Face, offered me a free glass
Frame. Through it clearly, I said, Non, Merci.
Seedy, reedy, smoky, needy, drunk, crazy, weed working
Lazy. The Party Town that never winds down, all the clocks
Are loaded, too. My Ballerina Boyfriend walked me in
Into incarnadine sin. Snaked out, some Freak relative
of Albert Gore, even had his name.
But I've seen it all before. I'm from Baltimore.
My greedy eyes absorb (as poets always)
That these buildings bulge with aging brick
Tiers of verandas, black cast iron
In writhing design. Geranium Clans in Cast
Wrap Party gather, chorusing stars of color.
And man, Bay-bee, it's HOT down here!
No one told me the sea salt sticks to sheets,
Wound up in my morning mashed hair look
Shroud Cloud, steaming like Monroe.
Even when you're dry, you're damp.
Your Hair is black like Forbidden, Body cut stern,
Spare like a Third Eye. Humor Words, Aura Spangling,
Nothing New Age, though. Dark as I painted Love,
Street Corner Dancer, even the Vampire want you,
But you've got a pulse, at least.
Hey! But I've seen it ALL before. I'm from Baltimore.
Suddenly something evocative . . . tender
Alters the chant of this alien City
A quaint Cajun girl, damp curls
Black as raisins circling her bonnet
white laced peasant blouse.
Curiously virginal, capers over the sidewalk,
Announcing incongruous innocence with each
Creamy Petticoat skip . . . rustle . . . step . . . rustle . . . step
Extends to passers-by smiling, one long delicate stem
her scarlet flower.
Submitted: March 21, 2018
© Copyright 2023 RexMundi555'.-. All rights reserved.
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