Shoe String Fries, And Other Small Mercies

So I'm sitting

slouched

in a corner

glaring at the world over the top of my

whiskey,

waiting

(watch out guys,

I have a steak knife)

I start tapping away

and realise

that's

how a lot of things start.

Not with steak knives

but with a drink in my hand

and a

bad

attitude

(my teachers always told me,

they were right,

you know,

I guess

some things never change)

I'll order another

(nowhere to be

nothing to do

that can't wait 'til

tomorrow,

next week,

after everything's

over)

I'll sit here

poking a piece of flesh

whiskey breath

trying not to glare

those frown lines

are deep enough

eyes

flicking between

two screens.

It's always the best way to spend

money you wish you never had to earn

nights you

wish you could remember

whiskey breath

you know you'll probably forget

those things you had to do

they can wait

anyway.

Everything fades.

the day

the faces

and you're thankful

for shoe string fries

and other small mercies

(the fact you can never remember

small mercies)

One drink to remember

two to forget

three

and that's when it starts to get fun

let's see if we can find the next thing

you'll eventually

wish had never begun.

Slouched over a fork full of

shoe string fries

and small mercies

and the whiskey the barman

promised

would be smooth and smokey

it's a small mercy there are only

meters to shuffle

in shoes that don't match

yep,

small mercies

it's wednesday and we're

more than half way there

so cheer up

drink up

shuffle on home and be thankful

that at least there are an abundance

of

small

mercies.

I'll Sing When I'm Full Again.

I pull up in the Getz and

get Ian to pour me a whiskey

it's where I got a taste for it, after all.

I don't want ice,

just a quick hit of dutch courage.

He gives me too much change,

and later doesn't charge at all.

He doesn't smile much,

Ian,

not at me, anyhow

but his face suggests that he does know how

it's all lined and crinkled

in a friendly

kind of way.

It's the kind of bar

that's cozy

even when there's just

a solitary man cuddling up to a coopers pale

on the counter top

and it's always filled with music.

Tonight, I try my hardest,

even though I'm filled with something else

and the back of my throat

feels like it's been trampled

by the footsteps

of the three thousand people who have

grabbed and pushed

and begrudgingly accepted the falseness of my smile

when that's all that I can give.

My croak is amplified.

My fingers fumble.

I fuck up.

I even impersonate Susan Boyle.

For fucks sake.

I'm out before midnight

leaving ladies

fading into the night's dark crevices.

With whiskey on my breath

and six hours before sunrise

I arrive home

accompanied by the sounds

of the inner suburbs

the rattle of the last trams

the barman across the road stubbing out

his last cigarette.

Six hours til sunrise

six hours to sleep in the cool dark calm

before heat and hellish hectic masses

swarm and rush

grabbing and pushing,

pulling from these clumsy fingers

that which they believe themselves to be

entitled to.

Later I'll put them to better use,

these fingers

that fuck up.

Later there'll be music,

as soon as I'm full again

I'll fill the air

in the cool dark calm

clumsy fingers

prising notes one at a time

from six strings of steel

trying to spell out

the things I'm unable

to

not feel.