The Best Day of the Year
We hung out on the roof at Cha Cha’s
watching the Mermaid Parade.
“This is my favorite day of the year,”
said Danny, snapping pictures
with a camera recently lifted
from the trunk of a Buick.
They need Mambo Mermaids
I said, as Zombie Mermaids,
and Vampire Mermaids
sauntered by. He ignored me,
entranced by glittery pasties
and hundreds of tits.
I had met Danny at the Siren Festival.
You can be my Coney Island Baby
was the first thing he told me,
while the New York Dolls played.
We danced straight down Surf Avenue,
all the way to Seagate where he rented
a room from a bunch of rabbis.
We’d been together almost a year.
You don’t need calendars on the boardwalk,
time is measured by cyclone screams,
sideshows, and wooden horses,
by two shadows on the sand,
by memories of striped chairs,
and thunderbolt rides.
We climbed down the stairs.
Danny tried to steal an antique car
but nobody took him seriously.
Coney Island kids paraded in wigs
left behind by drunken mermaids,
who now littered the street,
pasties lost, and breasts drooping.
“This is the best day of the year,”
said Danny, as we drank warm beer
and headed towards the after- parties.
We were never invited, but it was the best
day of the year, and we weren’t worried
about a thing.
© puma perl, 4/13/09
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