"The Chelsea Jail" is a recollection of an incident that occurred during my drinking career (and hopefully will not occur again). Taking the advice of the late LA poet Charles Bukowski, I have tried, in this poem, and others I have written, to "record the screams" as best I can, through the meld of memory and language.

Born in North Berkshire County, Massachusetts. Year of hurricane Edna. Mother and father went to Heaven before I was three. Was raised by Grandma and Gramp. Gramp was millionaire. Lost all his money to hospitals and died. I was ten: wanted to be Major League baseball player but was cut from high school team by prancing baseball coach. Went to college, graduated (Goddard College, '79). Went to work, worked. Wrote mostly prose until year or so ago when I became serious about poetry. Have lived in the central Vermont area for past 25 years.

Check out Wayne's new book of poetry, Words that Burn, at Amazon.com.

The night of the Ali- Ernie Shavers fight
I was at My Brothers Place
a bar near the Greyhound bus station downtown
and drinking gin & tonics
which were going down smooth
and I decided, after the fight, to take
a bus to Chelsea and
drink in a bar called "Heaven's Gate."
And I was having a good time
feeling up girls
until a fat guy said
that I had to leave
and I said "why?"
and he said "you are pinching the broads' asses
and they do not like it,"
and he and his buddies
hustled me out the door
into the pouring rain
and cold dark street
and I stood,
excluded from life's party,
and broodd until
I decided to go back in
but a half-a-cop at the door
said "you can't come in,"
and I balled my fist
and marked a spot on his
cheekbone where light
from a streetlamp glimmered
and I started to swing
but a voice
from Planet Crouton spoke
"no"
and I walked up the sidewalk
to the corner and a box
in the gutter
with a rock inside
a dinosaur egg
waiting to be discovered
and I turned and flung the stone--
a Don Drysdale heater--
through the bar room window
then ran
up the rain slick street
until my shoe came off
and I stopped to pick it up
as two guys from the bar
wearing softball uniforms
caught hold of me.
One guy held my arms
the other wailed punches--
Ernie Shavers' haymakers--
against my head
until the paddy wagon
pulled to the curb and
the two guys and half-a-cop
threw me inside
and drove me to the Police Station
where I was booked
and listened to a guy in the next cell
sing 'Lord I Want to Go Home'
all night long
while people from the bar
waited outside the jail for me
to be bailed out,
which
did not happen.