Slog
News & ArtsMonday, January 25, 2010
Comedy / Drunk Re: Famous Literary Drunks & Addicts, and On Being Local
Posted by Jen Graves on Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 10:09 AM
BJC, you have put me in mind of a Richard Brautigan poem I can't help loving.
"The American Hotel" Part 2Baudelaire was sitting
in a doorway with a wino
on San Francisco's skidrow.
The wino was a million
years old and could remember
dinosaurs.
Baudelaire and the wino
were drinking Petri Muscatel
"One must always be drunk,"
said Baudelaire.
"I live in the American Hotel,"
said the wino. "And I can
remember dinosaurs."
"Be you drunken ceaselessly,"
said Baudelaire.
And Part 3, 1939, is local.
Baudelaire used to come
to our house and watch
me grind coffee.
That was in 1939
and we lived in the slums
of Tacoma,
My mother would put
the coffee beans in the grinder.
I was a child
and would turn the handle,
pretending that it was
a hurdy-gurdy,
and Baudelaire would pretend
that he was a monkey,
hopping up and down
and holding out
a tin cup.
The true meaning of local:
1
If Jen is a LOG fan, I'm going to have to reevaluate every negative thing I've ever said about her art criticism...if you love the Gentlemen, you obviously have superior taste...
2
That reminds me of Danny O'Keefe's song The Drover – "I met him there in Pioneer Square in an empty bottle of Muscatel..."
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