Sonny is a friend of ours. Sonny is a tattoo artist. Sonny knows how to stick seven-inch-long nails up his nose, although come to think of it, I haven't seen him do that lately. Not in a long time. Which is to say, Sonny could be snorting cold steel on the side, and I wouldn't know it. But he did look great. He's aging into a kind of Dennis Hopper look, with the hair slicked back like Christopher Walken. He came home to see his pals along 13th Street. Everyone made a big fuss.

And when he trudged away yesterday afternoon during the Phillies game that the Phillies were losing convincingly at the time, he looked like Willie Loman on his way to Tacoma.

He didn't want to leave. (Ya think?) And we didn't want to see him leave. (Fuck him.) Because he knows the heart of the matter.