You Pretty Town

“San Pedro I will wring you out like a wet rag”

--Charles Bukowski’s “fear and madness”

My balcony’s structure can’t hold,

but it lasted long enough

for escrow to end before

boards brittled at my weight,

threatening collapse, so a grand

Lion King survey of what is mine

had to wait. What I can see isn’t

as impressive as Hank’s port view,

the Vincent Thomas bridge,

the freeway decorated

in divisionism lights.

My view was more like

John Fante’s Bunker Hill

where my house’s entrance

and garage were street level,

but the building itself sat

on the bank of Bandini Canyon

and Wells Fargo. Everyone is proud

of this 701 square foot accomplishment

while I am worried about structural

integrity and getting enough

classes in the Spring to make

mortgage because Winter

is never promised and rarely

given and teaching in the warm

months depends on population

whims. Hank threatened to break

and flay San Pedro while Fante

conjured the city, this sad flower

in the sand, begging Los Angeles,

give me some of you, while I sit

here, looking at a balcony I owe

that guarantees splintered bones and skin

while I promise I will write

about a darker version

of the port and the bridge

and the freeway and the process,

one that does not affect misogyny

and knives, one that will

probably go

unread.