Afternoon Nap

Afternoon Nap

I decide to lay down

Saturday afternoon

With my buds in my ears

Listening to my jazz station

Out of California.

A yawn or two

And I'm out.

Then it's a dim club

Somewhere.

I've been in too many.

I see a corner booth

Like Capone's

At the Green Mill

In Chicago.

I'm alone as

The waiter

Puts a string

Across the other

Opening which

Assures I'll be alone

I order a drink

Except I haven't 

Had alcohol in years.

I sit there when

The waiter picks up

A phone adjacent

To the booth.

I grab a sawbuck

Sliding it towards

him pointing

First to the bill 

Then to him

Indicating its his tip.

No response.

Then my eyes open

And I'm back on my bed.

Would my ten have worked

Like it did in Missoula?

Ending the night 

With the handsome waiter

In my bed at the attached

Hotel on the river.

I doubt it.

Ten bucks meant more then.

Now I'm just a lonely

Old queer with nothing

In my last home

Waiting to die.

It's the pandemic

Of the 2020s

When anybody with

Half a mind is just as lonely.

My bed is a dark bar

Giving a queer drunk

Something from memory

Of younger days.

I had dreams then

In Chicago.

Now I'm just a lump

No man would look at.

Dreams now are just

As lonely as they were.

Though now ten dollars

Is food for three days

Not a night's warmed bed.

Why is this music

Still feeding my afternoon?

Hunger doesn't end

Like one night stands.

Dreams do end also.

They end in a sigh.

Barry G. Wick