Billie

Sailors on shore leave
Canadians in jubilant New York
coming home from the war
eyes older, tongues spitting curses
they wouldn't be caught dead
saying a year ago, when they
first left home.

One of them is my father
barely twenty-one, earlobes
so fat under navy haircut,
teeth busting open his mouth
kind of smile you see on every kid
who makes it back alive.

There's jazz tonight, and beer,
cigarette smoke thick as fog
saxophone player floating
smoke-rings into the dark
where lipstick girls with swept-up hair
press welcome-back bosoms
into roughened, tattooed arms.

There's one old girl there, alone
sipping hard stuff, white gardenia
fastened over left ear,
and now the saxophone man
calls her to come up, sing.
She waves him off, but no,
he means it, he loves her
and asks again.

A few others know her,
cabaret card taken away
on trumped-up dope charge
unable to work in her own city,
traveling lonely trains to
other towns, clubs, hotels,
the mulatto side of legend.

Piano player lays soft beds
under midnight, high-heel bassnotes
walking the docks, drummer
brushing tears away as she
opens her lips, lonely sings
the one about the waterfront

I cover the waterfront
I'm watching the sea
Will the one I love
Be comin' back to me?

The young sailors stop talking,
set drinks down, listen
dig the tenor man opening
his mouth behind her petals,
sad eyes closing, letting
the song end the war, peace
wrap its warm overcoat
round her shoulders, waltz
her trembling heart
to morning.

DL