New Orleans The three of us, Gehr, Kuckuk, me, had walked Into the early spring, mud everywhere, The air still chilled by snow banks piled beneath the trees And filled our lungs with early morning air. He'd not felt well the night before and that had caused The time outside. He'd said he had to clear His head and get his heart to pumping life Into his veins if morning was to mean A thing to him. He wasn't young, he'd told us. He was old. And so we'd walked the two great danes, dark And eager as they sniffed the early sap Inside still dormant maple trees. We'd felt His spirit on the walk, half Irish fey, half devilment, So filled with joy he looked translucent in the sun. And when we'd climbed back up the muddy hill, Pulled off our boots, and went inside again, We didn't go into the living room, but stopped And parked ourselves around the kitchen table, cold And filled up with the energy the walk Had pumped into our blood. And then he did Just what he'd promised Ruth he'd never do. He made a pot of coffee, poured a healthy swag Of Irish whiskey in the pot, and served it up, A breakfast fit for kings and fools, he said. The stuff that made a man a lusty man. Then, steaming with a mood too deep to see, He started telling us about a time When he was young, just starting out, and nuts With all the genius he was doomed to gush Into the world. He'd been commissioned by the feds To go to New Orleans and do a mural on a wall,br> Near Bourbon Street. Another man, he'd lost the name, As big as any horse, from New Orleans, had been Assigned to help him out. The man had sung, Not talked, he said. He made the heat a symphony That rose off pavement and the wall in waves Of sound that filled the universe. His eyes shined with the memory, and then, his voice As sibilant and soft as water dripping from the trunks Of maple trees into spring banks of snow, He told the tale. "About a week off of the bus, He said, "we'd finished painting trees as dark With green as emeralds. We'd got down from the wall To see how what we'd done was looking when My pal pulled out a jug of absinthe, took a swig, And handed it to me. The feel it had inside My throat was good, and so we stood there as the sun Beat down on us and drank and looked and felt The mystery of art and life and love all wrapped Into the two of us just standing looking up Into a painting that was just half done And felt how just and right it was in New Orleans. "Then, just like that, the day was gone. We left Our wall and walked to Bourbon Street and heard Cacophonies of jazz and tourists dancing in the streets. The world was good, and we were good. No wrong Was left to trouble who we were or where our feet Would carry us no matter how much night Descended on the earth. "And then," he paused, As if to sort through memories too far away to find. "I can't remember how. We found a place With lanterns hung upon black wrought-iron gates And women dressed in ways I'd never seen before-- And everything was swirling, darkness, stars, The women, me, my pal, and some rich man Who kept on laughing like he was a clown. "And suddenly I felt myself, my manhood, bone, Saluting like a flag, the absinthe, blood, As hot and throbbing as a heart flopped from the chest And left to jump around alone without a man To keep alive. "The women, dressed as bright As peacocks strutting in the sun, began to laugh. And then I found myself in bed with one, and then Another, then another, on and on, until the night Had turned to day and day had turned to night again, And I was still as hard as iron, as hot as iron, Poured molten from a furnace at a steel mill. I think the women played with me, breasts, thighs, And bodies rocking in the motions born When men were not yet men and still not animals. "I got so sore I couldn't move and couldn't think. But still I drank and moved and tried to sing The ancient song until," he laughed. "I couldn't move. I couldn't even wizz. That's just how bad it was." He stopped and looked at Kuckuk, me, and smiled. "Nice walk," he said. "Spring's almost here." He tipped His cup, then stuck his tongue into the coffee's fire.