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2nd Street

Bottle, bullet, miracle,
Only three ways out of here

One too temporary
One too permanent
And the other just too damned unaccountable

Bottle bullet miracle
Only three ways past the shiftless barricades;
The streetlights that hunch metallic shoulders,
And spit down furious tufts of light

Storefronts lined with spiderweb thread
Pockmarked windows fogged with wait
The watchdog stare of parking meters
The bottled bags breezing into gutters
Liquored faces mouthing blindly
Vague attachments coiled and blistered
Resplendent shakings of plodding fireworks
The unhealing womb of the damnably brazen

Bottle bullet miracle
Only three ways across the borderline;
The promised lands where the busses don't run,
And the night winds don't turn into nooses

Babies crying through sullen palisades
Chain link fences rustily balding
The sneer of taillights winking on whitewalls
Garbage lids like writhing cymbals
Voices churning across darkened backlots
The poisonous spoils of lighted billboards
Ringing payphones against bricklined alleys
The crumbling prayers of distant sirens

Bottle bullet miracle
Only three ways through the feeble haze
Past the secret sacrament of downtown buildings
Merging blindly in a sweeping huddle
(As though to combine sweet warm breath)

The laughing bright of asking neon
The glossy lust of polished bulbs
The mechanical battalions in search of connection
The cold metal benches of teary solitude
The intangible fog of braided breath
The creaking wail of a thousand screws
The grating call of the insufficient champions
The hazardous climaxes and the cultivated moil

Bottle bullet miracle
Only three ways out of here

One too temporary
One too permanent
And the other just not worth
a damn at all

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