Pigeon Inn

Smoke curls lazily up
Up from the tip of the bartender's cigarette
Little fingers carrying nicotine
Walking into my nostrils
Dissipating into the air around me
Second handing everyone
Like a slap to their senses

But this is 1979
Nobody even notices
Not in the smoky haze
That passes for air
In the middle of the Pigeon Inn

A fat drunk in a blue STP shirt
Racks the balls on the pool table
Knocks his beer over onto the green felt
Without missing a beat
He yanks up his t-shirt and sops up what he can
Before the bartender notices
Before he gets kicked out for the third time this week

I'm here for the cigarettes
Not for me
For my dad
He gave me a five dollar bill though
So I had to go to the bar to make change
I ordered a Coke for myself
I asked for at least two dollars in quarters
To be included in the change

Sitting there on the barstool
In the smoky Pigeon Inn
Watching the drunks play pool
On the two pool tables in the middle of the bar
The two pool tables on the sunken floor
Two steps down from the surrounding bar
Almost a cruel touch actually
To expect people in the bar to step up out of
Then back down into
All without spilling their drinks
All without ending up flat on their faces
On the ugly orange stained office carpeting
That passes for the floor here

Makes me feel all of my eight years
To sit here watching for a few minutes
As long as my Coke lasts
Which isn't long on this hot day
I get to the bottom of the drink
Making that empty glass sucking sound with my straw
The bartender looks over at me when he hears it
I wave goodbye and hop down off the stool
Beelining across the bar
Down two steps
Between the two pool tables
Up two steps
To the cigarette machine
I jingle the quarters in my stylish seventies jeans
Digging out four of them
Pumping them into the quarter slot on the machine
Marlboro Lights
That one
I yank the little gold toned knob straight out towards me
The pack of cigarettes thunks down from inside
Landing in the long tray that goes the whole width of the machine

I grab the pack of smokes and head to the back door
To be dazzled by the midday sunlight
To be smacked in the face by the August heat
Assaulted by the noise and the smells
Of the racetrack and the activity
Behind the Pigeon Inn