DE POLLO

Never made sopa de pollo before. I've eaten it exactly once in my life at a mexican restaurant. That was three days before I married my wife. The morning after the bachelor party.

Tables covered in whisky glasses, beer bottles. A spill of Hoyle cards across the kitchen floor. Empty Wild Turkey and Johnnie Walker bottles. An old scarred Spike Jones LP on the turntable. Cigar extinguished in the mouth of taxidermied barracuda. Skin mag on front porch. Laid open and showing blonde Santa's helper hiding thick candy-cane. Where had everyone gone?

Large mexican girl in painted on black jeans. White straw Resistol. Pounds of torquoise jewelry. She looks at me and disregards my order. Instead brings me soup. Plate of tortillas. Soup was muscular, soothing. Boiled chicken thighs and backs and wings. An errant heart or liver. A scoop of clean white rice. Shredded cilantro. Chopped yellow onions, jalapenos. Avocado.

She brought bowls of napalitos, charred serrano like witches fingers. She asked me if I was hungover. She brought Tecate, V-8. Mixed them. Squeezed a lemon wedge into the viscous concoction. Hot sauce. Men in tights fake fought from the 42" TV. Drink this. Drink fast. Her nails must have been four inches long. Her nail polish the same color as her lipstick. Bright. Cotton-candy.

Two days later I was in Rome. Walking the ruins. Getting zooted on cheap wine, Campari, scotch. Laughing with K until my insides ached. Wondering how long we could possibly make two weeks be.