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Tell me where the gold is you said. I was stilling hanging with the mohawk kids down by the wharf. And the man who paints himself silver and stands still as a stone. Tell me where the gold is you said. As the fog rolled up from the Pacific, resting in the big red cradle. Down at the gate to Chinatown, some tourist from Arkansas took a picture. I drank dull coffee in a worn down room with new age beatniks down in the Haight, wrestled with the notion of not leaving. Choked on smoke and hid my words. Tell me, tell me. I was always more a fan of silver, I said. Not funny, you hissed. Clutching at my arching arms. Glad for the pressure, contact of misted skin. Leaned into the desperate dynasty of your asking. Fed like food, pulled slowly up steep hills in the cable car, eyes turning grey. You were opening me like a fortune cookie, but your greed was not for simplicity. Tell me where the gold is became the slanted chant your mouth made, awake or asleep. Every mechanical morning, all the written chests of drawers, drawers of chests. Eyes wild until the end, the riddle settling inside you like a rattle that foretells the future. A warning at best, worst.
