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I have a friend.
We share a cellar, which is dry though not warm.
I don’t bother with bras and girdles any more—just sweaters over sweaters, skirts over skirts or sometimes heavy work pants. Layers of clothing. Trick the tramps taught.
I steal from stores. I’m an accomplished thief.
Patrician old me! At one time I contributed to Bergdorf’s profits. Now I steal from them. (From it. This is no time to get careless with antecedents.)
About my friend. He’s a rat. Literally a rodent. Long-tailed, heavy-bodied.
He terrified me at first but now we have an arrangement. I feed him what I can; he brings me what he can.
What he brings isn’t always useful. But the food I provide isn’t always to his taste, though he eats it politely. Caviar from the cellars of a night club, for instance. (I
