Stan the Nightporter in Exile

Stan the Nightporter in Exile

In a state
of self-imposed exile
another period
of reconstruction.

Another crash and burn
life can throw these things.
Just learn to deflect
like Ali's Rope-A-Dope.

Because like the old cliché
that was
stinging in my ears
butterflies are free.

There on the second floor
looking over the park.
I put myself in exile
I knew I must have solitude.

I sat in the dark
seeing glimmers
of reptilian eyes.

She was so fast
that she just moved on.
She was moving
at some different vibration.

Watching the river flow
a hundred yards below
my mind wandered back
to a time
that seemed long ago.

May 27 1981
another scorching day
with my Karma
in retrograde.

That was the last time
I saw Stan the Nightporter
also
on that same day.

Stan worked
at the New Baby store
along my path
home from work
on Cheshire Bridge Road.

Along the same
stretch of road
as Johnny's Pizzeria.

Next door to Numbers,
a new wave nightclub
all the rage
that Spring of 1981.

I lived down
the big hill
down Piedmonth Road
near Ansley Mall.

In exile
in that old boarding house.

One day
I was walking through
coming home from work
and saw Stan the Nightporter.

He was
sitting in his truck,
reading
an Archie comic book.

We talked for a while,
I got his phone number,
said we'd
get in touch soon.

But times were really busy
back then
and we never did
connect again.

And now
39 years have passed.

I first met Stan the Nightporter
when he was
Bill Rumor's sidekick
on Tip Top Drive,
around 1975.

The house on Tip Top
set back from the street
a scene
of rowdy nights
of Rock-N-Roll.

My first view of the
sophisticated older kids
back when Columbus College
was called Cody Road High.

By the next year
this scene was busted.
Everyone scattered
or went into isolation.

Some by choice
others via a paddy wagon.

I saw Bill at The Loft
a few years ago,
he was playing guitar
in a band onstage
that night.

He smiled sadly
playing in his Slowhand style
lines on his face
depicted the decades
that had passed.

But no sign
of Stan
in 39 years.

I saw an old friend
who used to sing in the band
Stan the Nightporter drummed in
back in those times.

She said she
hadn't seen
Stan the Nightporter
since those days in Atlanta.

Seems he has vanished
into shadows of obscurity.

Our relationship remains
frozen
and I stand in solitude
in my isolation.

-Will Dockery