there was a place of Western Ave.
where you went up a stairway
to get head
and there was a big biker
sitting there
wearing his swastika jacket.
he was there to smell you out
if you were the
heat
and to protect the girls
if you weren’t.
it was just above the 
Philadelphia Hoagie Shop
there in L.A.
where the girls came down
when things got
slow
and ate something
else.
the man who ran the
sandwich shop
hated the girls
he didn’t like to
serve them
but he was 
afraid  not
to.

then one day
I came by
and the biker wasn’t there
or the girls
either,
and it hadn’t been a simple
bust
it had been a
shoot-out:
there were bullet holes
in the door 
above the
stairway.

I went into the Hoagie shop
for a sandwich and a
beer
and the proprietor told
me,
“things are better
now.”

after that
I had to leave town
for a couple of
days
and when I got back
and walked down
to the Hoagie shop
I saw that the plate glass
window
had been busted
out
and was covered with
boards.
inside the walls
and the counter had been
blackened by
fire.

about the same 
time
my girlfriend went crazy
and started screwing one man
after
another

almost everything good was
gone.
I gave my landlord a month’s 
notice and moved in
3 weeks.