Anchorage

Michelle Shocked

Anchorage

I took time out to write to my old friend
I walked across that burning bridge
Mailed my letter off to Dallas
But her reply came from Anchorage, Alaska

[She said]
"Hey girl, it's about time you wrote
It's been over two years you know, my old friend
Take me back to the days of the foreign telegrams
And the all-night rock and rollin'... hey Shell
We was wild then

Hey Shell, you know it's kind of funny
Texas always seemed so big
But you know you're in the largest state in the union
When you're anchored down in Anchorage

Hey Girl, I think the last time I saw you
Was on me and Leroy's wedding day
What was the name of that love song they played?
I forgot how it goes
I don't recall how it goes

Anchorage
Anchored down in Anchorage

Leroy got a better job so we moved
Kevin lost a tooth now he's started school
I got a brand new eight month old baby girl
I sound like a housewife
Hey Shell, I think I'm a housewife

Hey Girl, what's it like to be in New York?
New York City - imagine that!
Tell me, what's it like to be a skateboard punk rocker?

Leroy says "Send a picture"
Leroy says "Hello"
Leroy says "Oh, keep on rocking, girl"
"yeah, keep on rocking"

Hey Shell, you know it's kind of funny
Texas always seemed so big
But you know you're in the largest state in the union
When you're anchored down in Anchorage
Oh, Anchorage
Anchored down in Anchorage
Oh, Anchorage

A poem is a city

Charles Bukowski

A poem is a city filled with streets and sewers
filled with saints, heroes, beggars, madmen,
filled with banality and booze,
filled with rain and thunder and periods of
drought, a poem is a city at war,
a poem is a city asking a clock why,
a poem is a city burning,
a poem is a city under guns
its barbershops filled with cynical drunks,
a poem is a city where God rides naked
through the streets like Lady Godiva,
where dogs bark at night, and chase away
the flag; a poem is a city of poets,
most of them quite similar
and envious and bitter...
a poem is this city now,
50 miles from nowhere,
9:09 in the morning,
the taste of liquor and cigarettes,
no police, no lovers, walking the streets,
this poem, this city, closing its doors,
barricaded, almost empty,
mournful without tears, aging without pity,
the hardrock mountains,
the ocean like a lavender flame,
a moon destitute of greatness,
a small music from broken windows...

a poem is a city, a poem is a nation,
a poem is the world...

and now I stick this under glass
for the mad editor's scrutiny,
the night is elsewhere
and faint gray ladies stand in line,
dog follows dog to estuary,
the trumpets bring on gallows
as small men rant at things
they cannot do.

Charles Bukowski