23

9.30.06

A scary old man steals the stage. During the proceeding monologue, a ratty puppet show.

STORYTELLER
Once I knew a young boy from Limerick who walked to Chicago from Cork. Slick, as he called hisself (his real name was Ralph) was brimming with gimmicks and magic. Back then he wasn’t an immigrant: he was a slave (he’d say) to the ignorant. He worked horrible jobs pandering to yobs, playing the part of the sycophant. ‘Til one day he gave up entirely, squatted hisself in an old priory. He didn’t care if the monks were still there, and his breath was all brimstone and fiery. He stole the church for its address, killed a man to steal his name (Les) and whistled sour notes. He’d triple his votes by voting thrice, winning an office. He got the best bribes as an alderman. He got the best women when congressman. His lapel bore the pennant when he ran for senate, and he snorted cocaine with a hit man. Years later, when others came over, and emigrated from all over, the boy (now the man) devised his own plan to ensure immigration’d be over. He’d ambush the poor and the tired, ensuring they couldn’t get hired. To the huddled masses he gave worker passes, so the tempest-tossed were all surely mired. The irony grew bloated and warty. His constituents, once big and hearty, began to have doubts and took all the clout from the senator and from his party. The election caught him off guard. After he lost, he fell hard. He started to drink, and he started to stink, and he started to sleep in the yard. And now the ex-senator is homeless. Slick Ralph Les is hopeless and nameless. Out of the know, with nowhere to go, his mind became riddled with madness. With murder and lies his strategy, the bastard had reached his apogee. He went as far as he’ll go, and how do I know? Because the boy from Limerick was me.