Near Death in the Afternoon on Becker Street

Alan Catlin

202
“Every time I hear a car begin to accelerate
up the Furman Street hill, I duck for cover.”

It got so bad every gang banger
over the age of 16 with a handgun
and an initiation rite, used their house
for target practice, or, if they couldn’t
read the numbers by the flickering street
light, the one next door, never worrying
about actually hitting something, even
point blank on foot, or, driving by in
morning, early afternoon shoot out at
ever changing cast of characters or lost,
abandoned, stolen vehicles rusting on
nearby empty lot. Impossible to track
actual occupants since nuclear family
broke down following father’s second arrest
on federal trafficking and weapon charges,
records expunged from the System in some
kind of Witness Protection program on the moon,
the only safe place for him now, once he turned
State’s evidence, while the family business is
maintained by the teen aged sons with rap sheets
longer than the uncorrected proofs of
From Here to Eternity, selling with impunity,
rolling their own for anyone to see, even the police
who take them down but never for long.
All the under aged, unmarried girl friends, moms,
children, elder, aunts, uncles, cousins,
extended family, friends, procurers, mules,
on-the-street sales personnel and their double
parked vehicles, motors running, night and day,
percussive stereos rattling the windows, waking
small children, terrifying animals, the old, the frail.
Everyone knows where they live, especially
the cops and the news outlets, collecting evidence
after each incident, reports filed, just like the last
one, just change the dates, the names, the number
of empty casings found, speak with their on-
permanent-retainer, well-connected-lawyer.
They disappear for unexplained, extended periods
of time but they always come back, must have
friends in high places, hell, even the former police
chief uses, is doing hard time but not these guys;
they are still out there, at this very moment,
conducting business, while the neighborhood
kids walk by, to and from middle schools, primary
schools, high schools, their homes on the street,
personal safety of the innocent means nothing to them,
it’s all about moving product and maintaining respect
among their peers, they’ll do anything to protect
their standing in the community, anything at all,
even die; it’s only a matter of time.

ISBN 1-59661-129-4 66 pages/$9

You’ve read the Southern Gothic novelists like Flannery O’Connor, right? Well Catlin is the upstate N.Y. Gothic poet. He focuses on the ne’er-do-wells, the stumblebums, the never-have- and never-will-bes with accuracy, potency, and pathos. Catlin, a retired bartender and small press legend, knows his subject well, and he ain’t slumming. Bukowski would beam with pride, and might even be a bit jealous.
—Doug Holder,
Ibbetson Street Press

Schenectady provides the charm & Alan Catlin provides the wit in these nature poems that Wendell Berry wouldn’t write. It’s not what the Chamber of Commerce wants you to hear, but it is the kind of gritty city poetry that’s about your real neighbors. I've been hearing Alan read many of these poems at open mics & am glad to see them brought together in one place. But, I warn you that reading all the poems in one sitting will turn you into one of its characters.
—Dan Wilcox,
Host of the Third Thursday Reading in Albany NY,
publisher, poet, and performance artist

…like a long, sustained trumpet note: existential blues. i'm beat, man…
—T. K. Splake,
poet Backwater Graybeard Twilight