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Trading Eights with Storyville's Ghosts

A nun talks about the red light district out of habit
clutches a dog-eared copy of the Blue Book

of fast, faster, fastest women
its pages the color of cheap perfume.

Baby's older brother, Johnny, relaxes on a tailgate
where the Kid's 'bone hangs over the edge.

Behind the block-long bar at Tom Anderson's on Front Street
a dozen bartenders lubricate patrons

for a taste of the sporting life
awaiting them upstairs in private rooms -

100 lightbulbs guiding their way.
Madam Lulu's Mahogany Hall features Mr. Jelly Roll

a sometime pimp and ladies man
who calls himself Doctor Jazz

and likes to make housecalls with his Red Hot Peppers.
The 78 in the background is so scratchy

I can barely hear the steamboat
but it's there

along with the minstrel music and laughter
of long ago Sunday afternoons in Congo Square.