The steel slats from the bench dig into my legs, and we’re all damp in the air. A thicker layer of water combusts with a breezy diesel, filtering through the odor of overheated trash from the garbage can to my right…and I’m thinking about a few friends who died down here, and the sun’s going low behind down here and I lean back, facing the Mississippi’s crawl towards the Connection, and no matter how I shift, the slats still dig into my legs, my back.

I’m waiting for for the show, that exact moment of darkness when the brown lumps begin their scatter through the grass, humping up the levee to cross the Moon Walk, a run on the sunset when the really big rats exit the stony banks of the river to race towards the Quarter.

One of them used to live in the bar, when I bartended graveyard on Chartres.

And this is just one more shade of the city, the back of the bench digging at my elbows as I listen to the muddy river, as I listen to a rat left behind inside that nearby garbage can, scrambling for traction. It’s pretty close, but I don’t mind too much…a rat’s gotta eat, it’s what they do and the digging, frantic sound reminds me a little of:

Benjamin Booker – Violent Shiver

Have a nice day.