Night – Carrer Sant Pau

The street is Carrer Sant Pau & it leads to the bar Marsella where a small boy sits in a chair & prods me to buy his pipe which he’ll fill with his special mix of Asia & Africa & he slips between the slivers of light & is back with a jar & I strike a match & the band plays softly at first & louder & the boy is gone & his mother comes & lays out her cards & I’m told I have to choose & I take the red road & she leads me back to America & a dog I ran from & a girl I kissed in the basement & my mother who always behaved & my father who hid his stained collar like a sore & then I chose the blue road & she took me back to Angelica & a night in Marrakech when the breeze came off the desert & I heard the tapping of camels on the road & she knew how to apply tea to a burn & her lips to a swelling & after that I chose the black road & the peddlers of knives & potions & I bought one of each & ran ahead & heard my own voice in my ear & stopped & asked for the last & she opened her hand & in her palm lay a silver key & I took it & asked her to come & we danced & she left a flower in my lapel & I smiled at her decision & turned away & went on.