I bait storylines with a hook, Hanoi and Beer and Rats
It’s no make-believe, as I am known as Vietnam thinker
all those beers and yakking it up with Brits and Vietnamese
scientists, the juxtaposition of ecologists
looking at live pangolins and dogs for stir-fry
one bloke took the exotic bait, ordered deep-fried bat
maybe the same fellow we had netted a month before
looking for species and weighing critters
surreal, the Mad Dogs and Englishmen
kept swirling in my head
seems relevant we have two or six degrees
of separation, the laws of attraction
how in my shorts, my bicycle wet from rain
eating shoots and tofu and cabbage
the fellow starts yelling at me
how is it we both have t-shirts that proclaim
“I got stuffed at Chopes”
big green chile and yellow relleno
West Texas nights and New Mexico fields
“Who in the hell would have expected this?”
that endless puzzle of fields holding chile
and onions and lettuce, from El Paso
nearing Mesilla, New Mexico
a shit-kicker-looking adobe in-the-middle-of-nowhere
joint where braceros and buckaroos come in
order those foot long rellenos
domestic and Mexican brews
I took Tim O’Brien there with a group of groupies
shared salsa and tostadas with Kurt Vonnegut
had my thesis smeared with frijoles
as Jim Crumley ordered cervezas y guacamole mas
his book, Dancing Bear, now, in Hanoi
out of nowhere some gringo named Kent
yells, hey, you, dude, buenas noches amigo
this is back alley shit, our own hole-in-the-wall
joint where the Hanoi scientists took us
rats like Ricky the Raccoon messing around the street
under foot, looking for scraps of Pangolin tail
this Kent guy going on and on about the sheer
coincidence of meeting another El Paso rat
donning a Chopes t-shirt
random but fated, or set in motion from
something I may have said in El Paso
incidents with my students
or just smuggling cocaine for hellacious nights
this Kent ended up in the very same alleyway
8, 200 miles from Paseo del Norte
Denise Levertov was intrigued with the customers
professorials and lawyers and workers
her New York palette was pleased
Le Ly Hayslip of Heaven and Earth fame
dug the joint, and peeked into the kitchen
poets, writers, painters, pushers, pilgrims
you can only comprehend where West Texas meets New Mexico
in an alleyway in Vietnam
drowning some of my old man’s ghosts
The Big Red One soldiers blasting
humanity for the cause of sales and lies by generals
with no lips, no hearts, their souls captured by
big ass rats in Hanoi eating the dropped greasy
food at our ankles, somewhere looking back at Kent
disappearing into the random night in a chaotic world
with a Get Stuffed at Chopes t-shirt no one else in Vietnam comprehends!