Ode to a dark bar

remember when we could smoke in here?

I love bars. I’m not ashamed. I know it’s more fashionable nowadays to banish vices instead of celebrate them, and maybe we’re better off for that on a macro level. But I am a micro level, and I’m from the 80’s when vices were much less passé. It’s not as if I haven’t done my share of healing. I reluctantly quit smoking cigarettes several years ago, for instance. I’m not proud of that, but I got sick and I simply could not get better and smoke at the same time. I did make a couple exceptions in my quit: I am allowed to smoke again when I’m 70 and/or when I am in Paris. We’ll see. Anyway, bars. Dive bars, wine bars, airport bars, bowling alleys, martini bars, so many shades. We took booze, which has so much potential energy, the promise to make or ruin a night (or a life) sitting on the edge of a razor, will I fall in love or go to jail? We took booze and made a culture out of it. There is poetry, violence, depression, therapy, friendship, murder, and love in bars. There is neon light, the green of pool tables, the straining sound of jukeboxes. “Your cheatin’ heaaaaarrrrrt” There are names on the wall. The air used to be smoky. Our first couple years on tour everything reeked of smoke. My shirts were starched with smoke. You didn’t even smell it anymore. All the ceilings were yellow.

When I was 17, a couple of my friends played music in a bar in my hometown. The Jazz Club. They didn’t play jazz and the bar no longer exists. These are not connected as far as I know. This is my first memory of going to a bar and ordering a drink. I hung out with these guys and eventually played a little guitar on stage with them. I was with the band, which was as good as a valid ID in that place and time. I walked up to the rail, looked the guy in the face and ordered a few beers for me and the guys. He took my money and away we went. Years later I heard the owner of that place found out how young I was back then and was pissed about it. But, to be fair, no one asked at the time. I had a couple similar places in Duluth when I moved there after high school. I felt mature being able to “legally” drink.

I met Chloë at a bar. We call that doing it the old fashioned way. We saw a band and had some drinks and fell in love. That night was a fall in love.

There is sadness in bars. I used to frequent a joint in Minneapolis called Palmers. Pop in during the middle of the day and there are some people inside who look like they may never again have the strength to leave. There are names scribbled on pieces of receipt paper tacked to the wall behind the bartender. These people are no longer allowed a seat. The 86 Wall. They are often simple and vulgar descriptions: “Rat-faced red-haired mutherfucker who ran out on his tab.” The first time I went to Palmers was to find a legendary musician. The second time I was there someone got stabbed.

I don’t get out while on the road as much as I used to. I’ve become less social as I’ve gotten older. I do, however, have a few boozy haunts around the country I still try and visit when I’m in town. They’re like old friends. Always a tourist. I do spend more time in airport and hotel bars. These I find to be often without vibe or ghosts, but the transitory nature of the clientele almost makes up for it.

I’ll abruptly end this rambling about bars with a poem I wrote about a stop-off once in Laramie. Like many other vestiges of true Americana, the truly unique, weird, and worthwhile bars in our country are slowly vanishing. If you partake, I’d suggest going and soaking one up while there’s still time.

Noon at a bar in Laramie, Why-oming

hawk-eyed dusk a long ways off
the final hare loped in the icy moonlight
in the loft the hoisted paddles rest 
wood worn smooth as young skin
under the shaded willow
plucked by a smoky angel
wine-stained wings and jukebox coins and I had to move on
drunk in the midday got the place all to yourself
a slanted scarecrow waves his worn plaid arm and I wave back
old technology
the yard is rust red, metal and clover
old technology
wood pile like a temple leaning slightly to the northeast
there’s an aging but oiled 16 gauge resting on the mostly empty bookshelf
a couple titles I recognize
by pure faith hangs an old painting of a wheat field on the western wall
above the field the moon is bald and blue
lunch steams on the grill under the serene gaze of the cook
carved initials in the wood, flying grease in the air, cold beer on my tongue