Luyện nghe bài hát The Priest They Called Him

"Fight tuberculosis, folks"
Christmas Eve, an old selling Christmas seals
On Park Street
The "Priest" called him
"Fight tuberculosis, folks"

People hurried by, shadows on a distant wall
It was getting late and no money to
He into a side street and the lake wind hit him like a knife
Cab stop just ahead a streetlight

Boy got out with a
Thin kid in prep clothes
Familiar face, the Priest himself
from the doorway.

"Reminds me of something a long ago"
The boy, there, his overcoat
Unbuttoned, reaching into his pants for the cab fare
The cab away and turned the corner
The boy went a building

"Hmm, yes, maybe," the suitcase was in the doorway
The boy in sight
Gone to get the keys, likely, have to move fast
He picked up the suitcase and started for the
Made it, glanced down at the
It didn't look like the case the boy had or any boy would
The Priest couldn't put his on what was so old about the case
Old and dirty, poor leather and heavy
see what's inside

He turned into Lincoln
Found an empty and opened the case
Two severed human legs that belonged to a man
With dark skin, shiny black leg
in the dim streetlight
The legs had been forced into the
And he had to use his knee on the back of the to shove them out
"Legs, yet," he said and quickly away with the case.
Might a few dollars to score

The buyer sniffed
"Kind of a funny smell it"
"It's just leather"
"Well, some joker cure it"
The buyer looked at the with cold disfavor
"Not even right he killed it, whatever it is
Three is the I can do and it hurts
But since this is and you're the Priest"
He slipped three bills the table into the Priest's dirty hand
The Priest faded into the street shadows, seedy and
Three cents didn't buy a bag, less than a nickel
Say, remember that old Addie told me not to come back
I paid him the three cents I owe him
Yeah, isn't that a fruit for ya, blow your stack about lousy cents
The was not pleased to see him

"Now, what do you want? I you!"
The Priest laid three bills on the
The put the money in his pocket and started to scream
"I've had trouble! have been around!
I may my license!"
The Priest just sat
Eyes, old and heavy with years of junk, on the face
"I write you a prescription"
The doctor jerked a drawer
And slid an across the table
"That's all I have in the office!" The doctor up
"Take it and get out!" he screamed,
The Priest's did not change

The doctor in quieter tones
"After all, I'm a man
And I be bothered by people like you"
"Is that all you have for me? One quarter G?
you lend me a nickel?"
"Get out, get out, I'll call the police I you"
"All right, doctor, I'm going"

Of course it was and far walk to rooming house
A shabby street, on the top floor
"These stairs," the Priest
There pulling up along the bannister
He into the bathroom
Yellow wall panels, dripping
And got his works from under the
Wrapped in brown paper, to his room
Get drop in the dropper

He up his sleeve
Then he heard a groan from door
18, the Mexican kid lived there
The Priest had passed him on the
And saw the kid was
But he never spoke because he didn't any juvenile connections
Bad news in any

The Priest had had bad news in his life
He the groan again, a groan he could feel
No mistaking that groan and it meant
"Maybe he had an or something.
In any case, I can't enjoy my priestly
With that sound coming the wall"
walls you understand

The put down his dropper
Cold hall and knocked on the door of 18
"Quien es?"
"It's the Priest, kid, I live door"
He hear someone hobbling across the floor

A bolt slid, the boy stood in his underwear shorts
Eyes black with pain, he to fall
The Priest him over to the bed
"What's wrong, son?"
"It's my legs, seor,
And now I am medicine"

The could see the cramps
Like knots of wood in the young legs
Dark shiny leg hairs
"A few years ago I damaged myself in a bicycle
It was that the cramps started"
And now he has the leg cramps
compound junk interest

The old Priest stood there, feeling the boy
He inclined his head as if in prayer, went back and got his
"It's just a G, kid"
"I do not much, seor"

The boy was sleeping the Priest left Room 18
He went back to his room and sat on the bed
Then it hit him like heavy snow
All the junk yesterdays
He sat there, the immaculate fix
And since he was himself a
was no need to call one