day ONE THOUSAND and THIRTY SEVEN

just another old man with a ponytail and a beard

in san francisco on a saturday night

they come into vesuvio’s bar

right after my wife and i order our second beer

otherwise we would’ve left

there are twelve of them

cramped around a table meant for six

they look like a fucked up last supper

or the type of shallow trolls

who have to go out drinking

with their dozen closest friends

it’s saturday night in america

and i’m not made for saturday night anymore

but i’m all the way on the other side of the country

and i feel like i need to get my money’s worth

before it’s vodka on ice in the hotel bed

watching MSNBC and FOX News duke it out for moral supremacy

these apostles are loud and ignorant

the dudes keep screaming “bro”

and the women just scream

there’s a lot of five slapping

and talk about being wasted

and bar hopping or bar crawling

and how they been at it for hours and…bro!

one of the women says, like, this is the bar

where, like, jack kerouac, like, wrote all his poems and novels

not true

…but what’s really true anymore?

besides, no one cares anyway

with fresh five-dollar pints

of anchor steam littering the table

and the next pub already in their line of sight

the truth is relative

when the waitress brings our second round

i ask for the check over the sloppy din

like i’m someone important and have to rush off

and not just another old man

with a ponytail and beard

in san francisco on a saturday night

binging my new pint

like some kind of anxious frat boy

almost choking on the beer

as those kids laugh and scream through their round

kings and queens of the bar

their relevance so glaring

that it renders me blind.

                                                                                    

--John Grochalski