E. Garfield Blvd & S. State St. --- 1936

The rhumboogie was on the first floor Roy's trumpet and smile on the third. She fluttered her lashes like a fish breathing oxygen from water grinning like a sheep so he agreed to go packing up his drums for a fifteen cents jitney cab ride and fifteen cents more per seven steins of beer and hot dog at the club.
Sixteen years old six feet tall since fourteen was the divertive rub so the men at the door called him stud --- dancers pulling their dresses snatching dollar bill tips between their thighs jazz blazing crowds knocking tables half high leading John Barrymore, Bob Hope or Paul Robeson through the back door.
Like night-time plane jumpers folding their chutes gathering along the vast parkway dividing east and west, shapes of men, women children sleeping on top of the make-shifts or silky green grass
headlights passing or a full moon on hot summer nights was the only light needed to cold-sweat crazies chasing the dragon.
WWI vets gassed by the Germans --- offbeat, harmless, childlike --- neon dripping like pearl necklaces along the boulevard.
Dave knew the smile behind the trumpet the apostle once blew like 'Lil Dave's sax in Dukes band. The classy cabaret Swingland was an MGM Grand in it's day.
'Black Jack' won with a king and ace against Blue Boy despite the treasury of the coloured bartenders and waiters union in his pocket --- the house will always win. The club across the street felled by fire anyone can still hear the howlin' Chicago wind or the faint moan of 'Kit Kat' bringing home 'LaSalle Rendevous' on south state street in '41.