Old Men Drinking Shots with Draft Beer Chasers, The Lark Tavern, 1973
alan catlin
They open Albany Savings holding their pension
checks the fifteenth of every month, roll the bills
into a large wad they stuff all the way down
inside their fading green, County Worker pants.
An hour later. they are at the bar, sipping
Schaeffer drafts, 25 cents a glass, shots fo rye,
a buck and a quarter a pop, telling stories of
how it was before the war, how a man could go
five years without a decent meal or a drink
and how good life was now in a town where you
would always have work as long as you voted
City Hall's party line. The new man, behind
the bar was okay for an l-talian kid with a
beard; anyone behind the bar was okay as long
as the beer was cold those long summer days they
spent shooting the breeze so full of holes
the back bar mirrors bled.
