THREE MEN ON MARKET STREET, SATURDAY NIGHT

I.

A man with stubs
where his hands should be
plays electric guitar
on the corner of Powell Street.


The tourists pass by,
boarding streetcars
that will take them 
to more postcard-friendly attractions.

II.

Outside a donut shop
a man tenderly
places a bottle of  3 dollar
Cabernet at his feet.

He falls to his knees, 
bows and kisses
the ground in reverence,

as religious a ceremony
as I have seen.

III.

A skinny man with
wild eyes and a beard like Jesus
emerges from the Lucky Thirteen Tavern.

He takes off his shirt,
his pants, and then his shoes.
He places them on the ground just so
before walking slowly away.

I follow behind at a distance,
curious as to what he knows.

William Taylor Jr. is a Pushcart Prize nominated poet.  Words For Songs Never Written, a book of new and collected poems from Centennial Press is available here: http://www.centennialpress.com/wordsforsongs.html. He lives in San Francisco with his wife and a cat named Trouble. His work has been widely published in the small press and across the internet in such publications as Poesy, Anthills and The Chiron Review.