-
Speakeasy
- Callaloo
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Volume 26, Number 3, Summer 2003
- pp. 577-579
- 10.1353/cal.2003.0108
- Article
- Additional Information
- Purchase/rental options available:
Callaloo 26.3 (2003) 577-579
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( Speakeasy )
Kevin Young
The band vamped,
sunlight leaving—Sequined,
Delilah Redbone swung
her hardships & sang—
Sporting my lucky
hundred-proof cologne
I listened hard at the bar
as the house lights dimmed—
Rich widows passed matches
with messages in the flaps
Weary husbands with ring-
worn hands sweated
Like their drinks, getting up
the nerve to ask.
I tossed a few back
The band cranked, sharp,
trumpet neath a hat—
Glasses & dance
cards empty, ladies winked
For a light so often
—Say, mister—
You'd think you were
the election-year mayor [End Page 577]
Handing out favors.
Every joe here
Named John or Jack
or Hey You or Doe—
My answer, mostly, No.
Another round & the band
blew its medley midnight
Husbands hugged
their mistresses tighter
And she scat till the moon
caught itself
In the trees like a balloon
let go by a child, crying,
At the county fair.
My saltwater
Shotglass. My flask
Full of lighter fluid.
The piano boogied twilight
She sang & swooned & the sun
started up
An argument with what was left
of the dark—
The swingshift stumbled out
The graveyard drug in thirsty
& worse. Delilah sang on
About hearts that break like high-note
glass—or jaws—
That break more than men
in the mob-run union. [End Page 578]
The band beat louder
passing a hat, damping
Foreheads with uh-huhs
& handkerchiefs
While Miss Redbone sang:
Lord, I'm afraid
Woah, so afraid
I done married Mud
& took on his name.
Kevin Young is Ruth Lilly Professor of Poetry at Indiana University, Bloomington. He is the author of Jelly Roll: A Blues (2003), To Repel Ghosts (2001), and Most Way Home (1995), selected by Lucille Clifton as part of the National Poetry Series and winner of the John C. Zacharis First Book Prize from Ploughshares. His Blues Poems anthology will be published as part of the Everyman Pocket Poets series September 2003.
Copyright © 2003, Kevin Young.
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