Lykoeia
Lykoeia.
The howling of wolves.
Venting the agony in the wasteland
of nightclubs, bars, jails, parking lots
in the grubby all night greasy spoons
with the pizza oven in the window
and a heavy snow falling outside
at three in the morning
when the ghouls like us were out
like afterhours carnies from the Ex
the hooker in the corner
the pervert in another
the dealer in a booth in the middle
and hot camera for sale
by a drunk in another
who isn’t ever sure of where or who he is.
And the Mexican restaurants where we were banned
permanently for life twice
because no body drank as much as us
and our outrageous bullshit was good for business.
And everybody knew how difficult it was
to be an alcoholic artist those days
and get some really good work done
that never pays much
until after your dead
and everybody puts your picture up on the wall
and thinks of it as a signal honour
you got arrested first in their restaurant.
You didn’t live in the big homey
awkward cheap rent run-down houses of the Glebe
before it was gentrified back then
by the real estate agents who crashed our parties
to entice our women away,
property for property,
you encamped, tribally.
Parties ran from house to house
like waterclocks of booze
and every fourth bucket of a house
had a porch and a beached whale of a couch
you could sit out on in the dark with a candle all night
and listen to the music coming from the back of the house
and three doors up the street
with a toke, and a girl
who thought
as you let the story of your life in art
drift off into the cool night air thematically
like smoke from the end of the spliff in your hand
you were a wickedly dangerous genius
who could only be saved from himself
if he took her beauty and her pain
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poem by Patrick White
Added by Poetry Lover
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