Four from Downtown.
These four clumps of words--a recent poem, recent song lyrics, not-so-recent song lyrics, and some sloppy prose from way back--are all inspired by or associated with Boston's Downtown Crossing subway station. I used to busk down there. Here they are, from most to least recent:

One Girl Singing
Why is the sound of one girl singing,
Out-of-view, behind a pillar,
Politely, perhaps happily,
The saddest bird I've heard today?

Half-kept off-key tune in unison
With iPod, Discman, or Zune.
Its trace pulls down my skin,
My heart, and my pen.



Tunnels
Careful what you find underground
When you look under a sound
That wide gypsy smile in the night
Can steal the years from your life

He used the tunnels too well
They carry songs and strangers
He might come off as a clown
There's something else deep down

*He loves you
He loves you
He loves you
He loves you

Careful who you give your time
Your mind, your heart, your purpose
That fire in his serenade?
It has to burn him, too

He used the tunnels too well
And hid from all his teachers
If someone gave him a buck
He'd trade it for a smile

*

+Don't question his words
His million tries
He's the only he tells
All those gilded-bone lies
They're just gilded-bone lies

Careful who you give your goods,
Your family, and traditions
When wounds burst out and ignite
You're fighting serenade fire

He used the tunnels too well
Fought all the dark he'd summoned
To lure a light like you
Into his troubled life

*



Underworld
It's been too long since I've had a day
To put my feet in a better place
Close my eyes, an open case
Safety smile spread across my face

*I want to sing in the underworld
Forget the time, lost in my
Little underworld

The pounding sound of a morning train
It's raining coins at my feet again
Then afternoon with its rare delights
Weekday life, freedom sights

*

My tired hands and aching head
Worker bees on their way to bed
The sun has set, or so I've heard
Amid the songs of the underworld

*I want to live in the underworld
Forget the time,
Get the smiles,
I'm lost in my
Little underworld



Downtown Crossing
I took a moment to erase a reader
Rubbed out a line
To end that tainted perception
Of audience

Folks standing with fat pillars,
Walking on dingy tile
A furtive flirt, perhaps imagined
An echo from the Horn of Time

From Horn's wide rim phantoms stretch,
Special walls, unique to mine
Narrowing to zip, afloat in cone,
Are Wasses; and some Was roars outbound
With an orange-striped train

Squawking Negro girls, in brown jeans
With big mouths, big eyes, big tits, big smiles

Worker Joes and gigolos, schoolfled youngers
Pass me on this timeless bench

A buskeriff, piano, floats through halls
A cartoon aroma tugging my ear

I used to live right here

My hobo briefcase an open clam,
A wishing well for music's ear:
Mine for food, booze, books
Theirs for nothing I'll project

Early mornings' shiversniffs
Accompanied by buskeriffs

...at this point I'm interrupted by a woman, who's having some trouble with her bag. She's slurring and reeks of beer. She invites me to try and lift the bag, to test how heavy it is for me. I do that. It's heavy. She stutters, explaining that she needs to get it downstairs to the Red Line, but she can't lift it. She says, "You're a man! This is full of food and beer. I'm asking you for help!" I told her, "I'm sorry, I can't. It's too heavy, and I've got a disease that's making me very tired right now."

She then asked another man, whose wife kicked the bag and threatened, "Take your fuckin' bag and get the fuck out of here." She did.

Mornings, full of coughs and smiles, shouts
Drunken interruptions, intermittent praise
With occasional thrown cents, tokens, and bills
Jinking percussion to my croons and chords

A dollar was best, not only for $$$$,
But for the visible effort of a listener
Searching her purse, kneeling to case
An appreciative grin on her face

Money was nice, smiles were nicer
I'd proudly swell if a train were skipped
By an interested cantovore

Hours and hours, riffs cycle in time
With gusty intermissions
Trains ate my audiences
And each time, the theatre would fill again
Slowly, with unintentional critics
Silent, tired, and transitive

Halfway through rushes, most days
Absorbing the communal end-of-work mind
I'd kneel to my clam and collect my treasure:
Paper...to wallet
Quarters...right pocket
Small silver...left pocket
Pennies...to tile

Then jingle away with pounds of applause
Ascending, escalating, or riding my train
To sunsets and boytimes
Aching a sweet cramp
Of artistic courage
To someday fuel me again.



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