The Fat Man In The Blue Suit
The Fat Man In The Blue Suit
By Pete Funk
This ride is under
marble mottled skies,
the night’s rain
having brought down
the cool wet breath of ozone.
There is a fat man in a blue suit
who rubs his face
like he’s trying to pull
a poor night’s sleep
from his skin.
I heard him earlier
talking
about the teenage girls
riding the ferry
to the city.
We were all affected
by the girl’s giddy talk,
their too loud expectations
of some vast experience
that would occur at Geary
and Stockton
or the cable car turn around
or inside Macys,
places where wonders may wait
but only for the young and blind.
The fat man said something
about their “titties”.
It was the way he said it,
the staccato trip of
repetitive Ts like
an automatic BB gun,
that reminded me
of how dirty we all become
at some point.
Don’t deny your part in this.
this is very well written and i felt like i could have been on that ferry watching it all take place, invisible and quiet.
First of all, you found someone who already had the name I gave myself.
That was upsetting.
Secondly, I haven’t been able to write a “good” poem since I was 16, and even then, Fred Chappell was ridiculing my poems, and yes,
the entire school preferred Peter,
while meg and I moaned listening to “Your Own Personal Jesus”
and meg sang, “Your Own Personal Peter”
and neither of us ever stopped feeling sorry for ourselves.
i have just fallen into a mass confusion.
again… the impact of the last line would improve if there was a space between it and the previous line. i really like this the way it is… i just believe in emphasis thru space. lets see more of your work.
reminds me of the time i was about 11, sitting on the steps of Home Hardware waiting for my mom to get off work when an old guy walked up and started yelling at me, “Floozies like you ought to be ashamed of yourselves flaunting your wares like that!”
in other news…
and i can’t tell you why but
i can’t deny it. we all become dirty sometime.