South Street

Long ago

On the street where hippies once met,

And Cajun cafés cajoled locals

Beyond thin rib-eye with melted cheese;

And misty crystalline bell, book, and candle stores

Broke bread with places selling Manic Panic dyes,

And zippered mini skirts imported from London;

Where local musicians spun songs

About working for love

While waiting for big breaks,

And disaffected band boys squatted in shitty houses—

At that place and in that time,

We panhandled tourists

Wanting photos

Of “punk rock” girls.

The image for this is a combination of actual photos and whatever the AI could find from 1980s Philadelphia. For those who currently reside in the City of Brotherly Love, what I’m describing here probably bears no resemblance to what South Street currently is. I last visited around 2017 or 2018, I think, and it broke my heart. Everything described in this poem is real. There were two iconic Punk shops, a cool New Age bookstore, a well-regarded Cajun restaurant, Jim’s Steaks, and a local punk band’s house just a few blocks away. My friends and I did panhandle the tourists–a highly amusing past time for suburban kids on weekends. I bought clothes and hair dye at those shops, heard Ministry’s “Work for Love” blasted by a local band guy who worked at SKINZ, and later on, hung out with another band at J.C. Dobbs. It was glorious and I’m ever so grateful for the experiences.