Little Chicago

I grew up in Indiana
Sort of
In a small town
About to become a city
It was a matter of pride
That the tough delinquents
Like me
Sometimes called it
Little Chicago
There were whole families
Of very tough people
Transplanted up from
The Southland
And immigrants from Mexico
And Ireland
And Poland
Blacks from Mississippi
By way of the real
Chicago
There were generations
Of German farming families
Some with strange ways
Black wide-brimmed hats
And lacy bonnets
Pacifist and separate
They didn’t call where we lived
Little Chicago

The oldest of the Irish families
Lived along the riverbank
On the south side of town
Their forebears helped
Tow the barges along
Driving horses
Drinking
Fighting
Fucking

They had names like
Fitzsimmons
O’Conner
Wheat
Farrell
And they all came
In large
Numbers
The north side was where
The Rednecks and the Blacks
Lived
In separate neighbourhoods
On the same side
Of town
Of course this was all
Downtown
The Wasps had all moved
Farther and farther
Out…as the town became
A city
And downtown…north and south
It was Little Chicago

There were family feuds
That spanned generations
And people got killed
Went to prison
Kinfolk came up from
Alabama
Just to have someone or something
To shoot

Dynamite got planted
Women cheated on their partners
With enemies
Neighbours and friends got involved
Bullets strayed
Cops picked up pieces
And all the time
We got high
We were alive
In Little Chicago
Right after the war
Housing estates grew
On the farmlands at the
Edge of the city
Wealthy ex-farmers moved further out
And bought bigger farms
Wasp doctors and lawyers
Bankers and business men
Got rich
And built a country club

Factories came and used up
Even more farmlands
Creeks and rivers
Where we camped as children
In the countryside
Were soon surrounded
By houses
Roads
People

Cops were crooked
In Little Chicago
They protected gambling
Ran their own burglary scams
Shot people who wouldn’t be missed
Went fishing with ex-cons
And let the rich kids go
While the rest of us
Went directly to jail
While our poor proud parents cursed at the shame
I grew up in this place
Learned to steal there
I stole clothes that were in fashion
Money for hotdogs
Money for beer
Wine
And cherry brandy
I stole cars to drive fast in
I crashed one through the
Front doors of the school
And parked the bastard
In front of the
Principles’ office…I was fourteen
The neighbourhood
I lived in was called
Five points
Not north or south side
In-between somehow
But more connected to the
North side
By virtue of schools
And families

Some of the kids had fathers
That drank a lot
Fought in the wars
Worked long hours
And got short-changed
For their efforts
They didn’t talk much about it
Kids or dads
As for pride
Them in us and us in them
Forget it
We shared too much
To let pride interfere

There were of course
Normal kids who lived
In normal houses
With normal parents
And one point two siblings
The American Dream
Was theirs
New cars
New houses
New clothes
Merry Christmases
Senior proms
And they didn’t have to steal anything
Except for fun
But we laughed
More than we cried
We talked
More than we fought
We dreamed
More than we slept
We fucked
More than all the others
In their safe houses
Girls got pregnant early
And had their babies
And some married
Their teenage boyfriends
And got old early
And became waitresses
And smiled for tips
And had sore feet
And tired eyes
And hungry children

Lots of the kids had brothers
And uncles
And fathers
In prison
Some mothers had boyfriends
Who always had money enough
To send you somewhere
Like the movies
Or the park
Or the drug store
To read comic books
And drink cokes
And chocolate shakes
And come home late
When I was ten or eleven
I learned to go to Church
But not on Sunday
I would go during the quiet times
No priests
No believers begging on their knees
Or singing to the ceiling
Or parading their best clothes
I went to steal the folding money
Those beggars used for bribes
When they lit the candles
I always lit a candle too
Even though I knew that
God didn’t give a shit

I bought cokes
And candy
And cherry vodka
And hamburgers
And hotdogs
My mother didn’t have a boyfriend
My father didn’t have money
They both worked hard
And kept a house
For eight kids
A parakeet
A dog
An old car
And we all ate a lot of
Beans on toast
I stole a transistor radio
And kept the single
Earphone in my head
Music in my head
Love songs in my head
Sad songs in my head
I walked all over town
Tuned in to anywhere else
But Little Chicago