poetics about Duluth

I never lived in Duluth but worked there - I was a Wisconsinite in my early life.

I was looking up Superior stuff and found this - it is Priceless... TLH

Matthew James

about 6 months ago 

I did a quick search to see when Carlson Book & Record closed 

and found this quite nice interior photo on Flickr from just after the closing.

And then in an old Perfect Duluth Day post about a photography exhibit 

in commemoration of the store's closing, 

I came across a remarkably specific and evocative prose poem 

that seemed possibly written by Allen Ginsberg but actually comes from 

a former Carlson employee:

Because it's buried in the comments of the old post, I'll copy the text here:

 ...no photography can ever match the long term insanity this place has caused me.

(and i don't think i can stand looking.)

remember the mushrooms growing in the carpet in the "annex"? 

the fifty-year-old piles of soda bottles upstairs? 

the night we came in to work to find that the jerry-rigged, 

too-high shelving in the annex had fallen like dominoes? 

(i just turned on my heel and left that day, 

refusing to gaze upon all my hard work in a gigantic pile on the floor. 

even if it did include the romance section) 

the smoking Jerry-rigged electrical system that made customers 

and inspectors alike swoon like 18th century ladies? 

the evening some freak shit in the classics aisle 

and wiped his ass with a copy of Madame Bovary? 

Daniel, flat on his ass, muttering in Russian? 

the day Katastrophic Kari peed on the floor in the porn section, 

and passed out on the ramp with her tee-shirt up around her waist, no undies?

 the day we arrived at work to find the IRS blockading the door? 

the holes in the walls and gaps stuffed with porn where the creeps could hide and wank? 

the weirdos, the tweekers, the porn addicts, the japanese vinyl hunters, 

the dismayed and angry tourists, the aghast, the scroungers, the homeless, 

the drunks we knew and loved, the drunks we hated, the 86'd, the lurkers, the thieves

 (oh, the thieves!)? the endless cry for hand-outs, the gambler's hand in the till? 

the endless insubordination that kept the doors open? 

the hiding of cash beneath the drawer so it wouldn't go drifting out the door?

Angela and Larry and their sick relationship playing out 

in marijuana tinged paranoia, 

Jerry the "electrician", his girlfriend Brenda (who died while no one was looking), 

Loud Kate (now safe and enjoying her retirement in AZ), 

Craig the sleezy magician, and Daniel the fallen Russian Aristocrat, 

Bob the album snob, and the amiable Lumpy G. Ernie,

 who never wore socks, even in winter. 

the short-timers like Leona and Dave, who apparently got their jobs

 because they slept with the de facto manager. 

the Supreme Evil that was Bud. Laurie, 

whose death was mysterious in its lack of surprise.

the Old Man--the mystery, the incomprehensible stubbornness 

that was the Old Man. an enigma, a source of inestimable frustration, 

kind to a fault, weak in his self-indulgence, 

but incredibly strong in his love for those who were wounded 

and unwanted. no one remembered that he was the man responsible 

for making the First Amendment count in Minnesota--

that the bookstore was his last stand, 

the remains of an always wobbly empire. 

the day his son died, 

the ancient timbers of that building shook with his grief--

a sound i'll never forget as long as i live.

damn. i'm all teary now. the fact is that i could barely stand to visit 

the place after the Carlson's sign was painted over. 

i had no money to spend anyway--

but it was the change i couldn't bear to witness. 

it was like i could only walk through it with my eyes closed to keep it as it was in memory.

it had to remain untarnished in my memory. 

but after Bud and Heather ripped off Ben and Kevin, i boycotted forever.

RIP, Duluth's Finest Tourist Attraction. your story is yet to be told. photos are only a tease.