Psyche of Storyville, by Brian Kates

Untitled, photography by E. J. Bellocq (USA) c. 1912

Psyche of Storyville

Naked, nameless, face erased,
she draws a butterfly to lift her up,up, up
above the slate-gray roofs of Storyville,

above the Blue Book beauties in white-lace
slips and gartered stockings, lips rouged
red for more than kisses,

above madam’s silk and feathers,
pimp in fly fedora, folding razor
in his shiny, high-top boot,

above the taunts and slaps,
the blackened eyes, the burns
of cigarettes, the hazy lies of opium,     

above the “slavish trade of mortal life”
she sees the chariot swing low
and hears the trumpets blare, somewhere

above her shame,
above her pain,
above the camera’s leering eye
​
Brian Kates

Brian Kates, a longtime newspaper man, holds a Pulitzer Prize, George Polk Award for editorial writing and Daniel Pearl Award for investigative reporting. His book, The Murder of a Shopping Bag Lady, was a finalist for Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Allan Poe Award in non-fiction. Two of his poems were published in The Ekphrastic Review in 2019. Other poetry has appeared in Third Wednesday, Common Ground Review, Poem, Red River Review, Modern Haiku, Frogpond, bottle rockets and cattails.  He lives with his wife in a house in the woods in the lower Hudson Valley.