Brooklyn Cop by Norman MacCaig Lyrics

Built like a gorilla but less timid,
thick-fleshed, steak-coloured, with two
hieroglyphs in his face that mean
trouble, he walks the sidewalk and the
thin tissue over violence. This morning,
when he said, “See you, babe” to his wife,
he hoped it, he truly hoped it.
He is a gorilla
to whom “Hiya, honey” is no cliché.

Should the tissue tear, should he plunge through
into violence, what clubbings, what
gunshots between Phoebe’s Whamburger
and Louie’s Place.

Who would be him, gorilla with a nightstick,
whose home is a place
he might, this time, never get back to?

And who would be who have to be
his victims?