Classic Poem

Waiting for our turns at Louie the Barber’s,
we look through porn culled from the coffee table,
at the silicon breasts, the buck green eyes,
and listen to the dirty jokes, each fable

of conquest. A draft from a swirling fan
spreads the scent of booze and talcum powder.
And we avert our eyes from the long face,
the ugly young man in the chair, as louder

the clippers buzz, and locks of golden hair
fall from his scalp, commingling with the dust.
Goat-like, with pimples oozing pus and blood,
he evokes not pity, but disgust:

the thought that we too must sit in the chair,
we with our porn, our dirty jokes, our folly,
the booze in our guts like gehenna’s flames,
but all of us still beautiful and holy.