Art and Politics / Politics and Art

Capitalism

25 Capitalism 1. the girls The girls out there are young and scared stand tall on platform shoes their pimps at the corner in phone booths watching Walking my dog at night I, too, am scared the crazies must march their torments that crowd them in small rooms, the junkies must find pushers and the drunks disgorge their anger The girls out there— set on the block at intervals stone-eyed caryatids of their littered turf I pass them pimps watching 2. pimps: from the Library glass-enclosed patio We sit, talking. The girls in the rain beyond our glass, our caul walk delicately with umbrellas as if balancing something of value on high wires. Across the street, four pimps stand under an awning:: 26 they are splendid in silver and sharkskin and broad-brimmed hats and rings and canes and high platform shoes to gauge their merchandise offered from that level their gaze like strings like wires pulled taut for the girls to walk on. 3. questions for an entrepreneur pimp did anyone love you little or hate you then? is commission your contact? are power and poverty so mixed in you that the girl you subdue who trusts you to protect her small interest is your pride the tarnished iridescence of a hatband? did Adam Smith, Vanderbilt, Morgan or Rockefeller weave your pallet of prurience? did they teach you the fun of the profit the enterprise? entrepreneur, landlord without land sultan of slumbodies you parade their gargoyle emblem for a pair of new shoes 27 in a passing style for a roll with butter for a tinkling trinket and a dream-puffing weed boss, now selling your sister ...