NO XMAS

for Jon Alan Carroll

such a righteous story you
told all those years ago about
that drunk who picked you up
hitchhiking Xmas Eve on the
downside when the dude says
there ain't no Xmas for
bums like us that it has stuck
with me this far past every
agonizing holiday and reminds
me of the time I played Santa
at the Emporium Capwell in
San Francisco when some kid
had asked me to please cure
her mother's cancer right after
this other girl had wanted the
fur coat in the window down the
street at Macy's each with the
distinct pleading of their own
station in life which made it
easier to customize the lie so
that when after the shift was
over and I took off the costume
that reeked of piss from hundreds
of kids sitting on my lap all day
I felt like what that prick God
must feel like and I punched out
to go get a double shot backed
with a High Life not exactly too
gentle into that Stille Nacht