good cobbler

good cobbler

under the placard
by the door of the third pick-up bar
in a row of no-cover
pick-up bars    where girls line up
like slinky kouroi
and boys in clingy shirts
wait longer, there is

another door, smaller and dingy
which stays locked
till the stools are all up standing
on their heads, and opens in onto
a room just big enough to swing,
drunk on its hinges,
plus two stirrups, dented can
of mixing glue, lapful of rags,

and the folded lawn-chair of a man
with polish in his teeth    whose two hands
do the work of one, who sounds his vowels
like a clopping sole.

I had a shoulder bag that hadn’t
zippered in about a year,
and asked if there was something
to be done. He rubbed the thing
with half a wick-starved candle
and the teeth just bit.

“you do like this, one in a month,
about, and it work fine,” he said
and charged me 30NIS, which buys you
three full days of vegetables
and cheese.

~ by jonlib on May 30, 2009.