Petrillos in Watertown
             
My hooliganism begins when I order a pastrami on rye with cole slaw
at Petrillos in Watertown
then spend five hours talking to Jimmy about Joe Namath
and the old Boston Garden.
Even though he refers to the cheap seats as “Nigger Heaven”
I love him for the salt in his tongue
and the truck stop in his chest.
You could park a fleet of semis in there and never feel lost in America.
His America used to exist between a box of cigars and a slab of sopresseta.
Now he wants out.
He lives upstairs with his wife of forty three years and can't get enough sleep.
When he tells me I'm from New York
I want to jump over the counter and smash him in the mouth
with my mouth.

There ain't no delis anywheres left in this country
where you can get an interesting piece of meat.

Fantasy:
We're on a boat somewhere in 1971.
I'm six.
He's twenty.
The whole place smells of piss and shit
but what's not to love?
Muhammad Ali just beat George Forman or you could get a slice of pizza
for a quarter
then watch all the Italian girls get married.
I want to be his son and forget about my pastrami with the cole slaw,
we bust up every fancy lobby
from South Boston to Falmouth
with a bottle of cheap beer and a pack of smokes.
But who am I kidding? I don't smoke.
Don't even drink cheap beer.

Jimmy's got a memorabilia wall of Bob Cousy photographs, signed, and G.I. Joes
in the original packaging
that he's saving for his grandkid.
When I make like I know something about Bob Cousy
my hooliganism is a Brooklyn accent that I can slip into and out of
to feign place. Never mind it all.

I will visit Petrillos every month till Jimmy closes up shop,
spend my 5.25 on his hot pastrami
and pretend, for five minutes,
that I have six brothers named Anthony
who work in construction.