"All I want is to have a little
fun
Before I die," says the man
next to me
Out of nowhere, apropos of
nothing. He says
His name's William but I'm
sure he's Bill
Or Billy, Mac or Buddy; he's
plain ugly to me,
And I wonder if he's ever had
fun in his life.
We are drinking beer at noon
on Tuesday,
In a bar that faces a giant car
wash.
The good people of the world
are washing their cars
On their lunch hours, hosing
and scrubbing
As best they can in skirts and
suits.
They drive their shiny Datsuns
and Buicks
Back to the phone company,
the record store,
The genetic engineering lab,
but not a single one
Appears to be having fun like
Billy and me.
I like a good beer buzz early
in the day,
And Billy likes to peel the
labels
From his bottles of Bud and
shred them on the bar.
Then he lights every match in
an oversized pack,
Letting each one burn down to
his thick fingers
Before blowing and cursing
them out.
A happy couple enters the bar,
dangerously close
To one another, like this is a
motel,
But they clean up their act
when we give them
A look. One quick beer and
they're out,
Down the road and in the next
state
For all I care, smiling like
idiots.
We cover sports and politics
and once,
When Billy burns his thumb
and lets out a yelp,
The bartender looks up from
his want-ads.
Otherwise the bar is ours, and
the day and the night
And the car wash too, the
matches and Buds
And the clean and dirty cars,
the sun and the moon
And every motel on this
highway. It's ours you hear?
And we've got plans, so relax
and let us in -
All we want is to have a little
fun.
Copyright © 1987 Wyn Cooper
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2 comments:
I've always come back to this over many years. I suppose I wouldn't have heard of it if not for Sheryl, but I thought to look up his book of poetry, though I never got it at the time I searched. It's hard not to hear the music while reading.
I've read this poem maybe 20 times. Each time I read it I get something more out of it. There's always one more detail, one more "Oh...yeah."
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