-First smoke-

Near twilight and I'm riding shotgun

In the '57 Mercury Turnpike Cruiser as it sits
Like a stone in sculpted sheet-metal at the curb

In front of Mike Lipsky’s house.

We’re too young to drive,

We don't have "permission" to smoke cigarettes

And my sneakered feet are resting

On the dashboard, its girth running door to door.

My mouth is dragging cautiously 

On one of two Pall Mall's

Mike lifted from his old-man's pack the night before,

The open pack foolishly abandoned on the easy chair's armrest

At the close of late night television.   

Now the smoke's penetrating harshness

Is stinging the back of my throat,

Burning the inside walls of my nostrils.

The late Friday afternoon in August is clear

And the smoke is drifting

Through the Mercury's open windows.

The plan is in place;

Smoke a couple of long Pall Mall cigarettes

Then chew a few sugary sticks of "Juicy Fruit" gum
In an attempt to mask the scent of tobacco at the frantic

Supper tables.

Mike's puffing away behind the wheel
Pretending to wind through the heavy Mercury's

Three speed "Merc-O-Matic" transmission
As a pine-scented deodorizer in the shape of a tree,
(Purchased from Chasidor Leo's Variety Store)

Hangs from the dashboard radio's knob
In our clueless attempt to perfume the interior.

How beautifully the ejected blue-

Grey smoke expands its shape, adding

The colors of nature into surrounding space

Like the veil of the Crab.

But a side-yard away, standing at the living-

Room window of his house, my father

Is grinning with a cool disposition  

And with a mouthful of Pall Mall smoke exhaled

To beautify the atmosphere, I see him.

This is why the condemned consent

To a blindfold at the wall.

Home from work early

He's close enough that through the lifted

Set of venetian blinds I clearly

Map-out the whiteness of his dress-shirt,

The ballpoint pen protruding upward from its pocket

Attached to the riven cover of his sales ledger and lastly
The dark-blue narrow tie with its nifty clip attached.

(This tie clip is like all the tie-clips

Of all the salesmen on the road;

A gold-plated bar

Fastened too tightly into the shirt

Causing a disturbing tension

In the material at the button-hem

And In the middle of the clip,

A recess holds a square

Of fake black onyx with a little fake

Diamond glued in the center of the onyx.)

The grin of my father’s mouth

Seems an inch from my face

And when he sees that I've noticed him

Through the hanging smoke

His grin expands to a smile

Worthy of a Hollywood slasher.

He’s young enough for a full set of teeth.

Frozen, with a non-retrievable

Pall Mall cloud simmering at my face,

The Mercury Turnpike Cruiser becomes a metal tomb,

The smoke of tobacco shivering in the atmosphere
Like the anxious testimony of a stool-pigeon.

Dissipating slowly in its muted blues

The remnant of the great Pall Mall fails in the end
As I had failed at the face of my father, the skin of my own face

Inheriting the khaki color of nicotine. —

And I longed for the blindfold standing before the wall,

Not for the smoke of a last cigarette,

And pissed in my pants the way all of them do.

-The River-

Morning in winter.

Then the greying

Darkens southward as it goes
From below

The hill of the city.

The river

Drives as an arm of the sea

By the turn of the Earth

By the Moon pulling it

By things which are measured

By things which are not — then drops

To the ocean's mouth

Which inhales to claim it.

I hadn't seen the river as brethren;  the blood-

Related as now I do.

The water's color is perceived

From particle absorption

And reflection of atmosphere

Greying from sediment the silt

Kicks-up from its bed.

Testimonials are read

From the clinging tenements written
In an indelible text.

The river flows before them,

From the foot of the hillside where

Before my time the railroad tracks were laid

Running north to south from here to Providence.

                                   

                                

-Edwina on the inside-

    1.

My young father, a G.I. in '41

Assigned to duty, stateside in the Military Police

Came back to his house

When his World War ended.

In time, he'd show his firstborn son

The little diagonal scar on the fleshy

Fold just above the hip
Where the Nazi's fierce bayonet struck.

It must have struck somewhere in central Minnesota.

    2.

Uncle blows a puff of smoke
From his hemp-like stogie

Into the infant’s face
For the pleasure of its reaction.

Atrocities such as this were commonplace
And often captured on 8mm motion picture film

During family get-togethers, on holidays,
Or after the funerals.

There were no arrests.

Uncle's house-fussy wife

Keeps her parlor straight, unoccupied,
Tucked neatly under a taught, clear vinyl

Waiting for the presence

Of a more deserving company.

      3.

This is how the old-man's 1958 Buick Special

Was made to go faster:

Surreptitiously, drive it to Joe Powell’s farm in Tiverton,
Where Joe dismantles the stock, two-barrel
Carburetor from its manifold,

Replacing it with the thirsty four-barrel carburetor

Waiting in a shallow pan of gasoline

Next to the riven-coated junkyard dog, attached

To a short, metal-staked leash.

Raymond Bassinette’s impertinent '59 Pontiac Bonneville 

Was half-a-car length faster through the quarter-

Mile stretch on Route 6 East just beyond

The Westport town line later that night.

      4.

Years earlier, this poem-writer's teenaged sister
Arrived home from the goldmine of the Sacred Heart Academy

Entering through the kitchen with the fascinating

Edwina Mello in tow,— the door

To her bedroom then closing tightly behind them.

From the frantic activity at the kitchen sink

He is told to mind his own business.

Left standing at the cruel

Obstruction towering before him,

The sounds of Edwina's muffled laughter

And Elvis crooning "..down at the end of lonely street.."

Begin filtering their way through.

That's... the early Elvis.

                                                   Quequechan

                                   

  

-a short poem written while listening to

 Bob Dylan’s "Theme Time Radio Hour"-

the grillman living on the moon

runs a diner in a place without atmosphere.

he wants to go outside,

but he needs to keep his helmet on,

besides,–– it’s busy at the counter.

there's a stillness to the outside of life

in a place without atmosphere
and the grillman wants to pull his helmet off,

get out from behind the counter

and run around the moon. but
no one’s ever done that on purpose.

meanwhile, adding to the urgency,

the greasy little radio

sitting on the shelf above the spitting frialator

romances irresistibly:— “there's a blue

moon on the bayou tonight." 

                                        

-the privileged man-

I don’t see the homeless

as they wake-up to the new day in Swansea.

I don’t know where they sleep.

there doesn’t seem to be anyone

around whenever I decide to walk

across the backyard at sunup or when

I’m driving to the Stop & Shop

for the eggs I’ll need right away,

maybe stopping on my trek
through the sharp florescence
toward the checkout registers to nab

an intriguing kitchen implement
hanging in that blister-

packed aisle of nickel-plated horrors.

there are those who assist the homeless

and I guess I could phone one out of curiosity

to inquire about the availability
of an updated map to the places where
the homeless settle-in for the night,

but the non-profit organization might ask me
to ante-up with a donation

before they surrender any information

and I’m not so fully engaged.

this morning the sunlight is good

as it pushes itself inward from the east

and the birds are active

at the water-bath I set-up a few days ago

under the giant evergreen

in the front yard at the stacked

field stone wall near the sleepy

roadway running northbound toward Route 6
and southward toward the Mount Hope Bay

or in whatever direction the homeless find themselves

this early Wednesday or Thursday morning.

                                  

-Dandelion heads-

Thursday morning I pulled
a small gathering of dandelion heads

from the grass in the backyard.

I'm thinking of driving

to the Cape for the afternoon
although the Cape in May

isn’t as rewarding for me

as the Cape in December.

(There's something about the attitude
in the glacial remnant of an age of ice
as being best approached in the time of ice.)

I’d just as soon stay-put.

the neighbors hadn’t complained

about the dandelions and I might've been
a little presumptuous,
but in fairness, the procedure
was accomplished through my own initiative.

now the geologists have informed me
that the Cape and its great outer beach

will eventually be lost beneath the ocean,
here longer than human beings have lived,
but not lost by December next, so there's no need to hurry.

In the meantime 

I'm looking out the window toward
the backyard in a preemptive once-over
to fend-off notifications from neighborhood busybodies
that I might have missed one.


                                                             Swansea

-home again and guilty-

I was told

to ride in the backyard

not to cross Healy

to stay away

from Rachlin’s crazy 

junkyard

then told to ride on the sidewalk

in front of our house

and then no farther

than Quarry street.

that distance expanded

to the Pepperell Mills
on Bedford west of Quarry.

but by then it was too late

to quarantine me from the city of my birth

and I rode her far and fast
beyond the parameters
into the city dump

in search of amusements

the treasures discarded by the people.

surveying the smoldering
mountains of rubble,—

here are the beaten
baseballs in blackface for me to consider and

crusted rubber fender-flaps
with an overpowering ruby
stuck in the middle for the cherry-
red Schwinn.

we weren’t looking for trouble.

later, we walked our way

up the stairs and into the entry where
I left her leaning on the pea-green
wall of wounded plaster.

I went inside

through the spring-screeching

screen door to the kitchen
where two flies found the opportunity
to inquire within.

I stank-out the place,
saturating the first floor tenement
in the burnt melange
of the rotting city dump
and was banished to the tub
and confined to quarters.

in the kitchen,
the flies were executed with dispatch
leaving little
abstract expressions of themselves
on the counter near the sink.

in the entry, she kept to herself

leaning there as sweet as a wallflower
waiting for my time to be served
and another proposal to dance across the city.

                                             quequechan

-the hours between 5 and 7 PM-

1.
In the beginning
the oilcloth
is swiped with the dishrag

to prepare the table for its setting.

In the end
the oilcloth
is swiped with the dishrag

to close-out the chapter.

between these moments

lies the body of work, the living quarters,

the barely controlled chaos
the struggle for the prime-
cuts at the beam, the belly
of the fresh baked pane.

on the floor at the table, the arched
sitting posture of anticipation is

displayed by two determined cats.

2.

he wears his necktie at the supper table.

there is no requirement

for him to “change-up” after a day on the road.

from barroom to barroom, restaurant to restaurant,
the scent of stale beer hangs over him

wafting into the pungent scent of petroleum

released from the oilcloth.

If it’s not the summer of houseflies
it’s the field-mice of winter, warming-up
in the pantry's cupboard under the sink

seeking refuge from the cold machinery
of the junkyard's metal-to-metal dissonance
beyond the backyard fence. 

the clip holds them down,

holds them in place
like the clip of the salesman's necktie
holds it in place at the hemline of the button's row.

3.
the dress-shirt of the road-weary liquor salesman 

is refreshed and ironed in the early evening.

the ironing board
is set-up in the living room,

locked into place waist high
and she irons with steam heat,
working the board over the plains
of cloth, paving the fissures smooth 
as the family gathers for the nightly
hypnotics of television.

the rehabilitated dress-shirt
is hung by wood at the shoulders
from the top of the closet's door

and through an act of permanence
she runs her hands the length of its sleeves,
confident in its appearance for one more day,––
another day out there on the open road.

                                                Quequechan


                          

-Columbus Park Incident-

Inching the stiff, the blue

Denim's unforgiving cuff above the knee, the terrible

Wound is exposed,––

Its flap of torn flesh, pleated

Like an accordion’s bellows, is hung

At the edge of rawness, the wound
Stinging like hell

And to make matters worse

I was called out at second,—

Called out by Albert "Rags" Ragonesi 

The usual pick-up umpire

Who couldn’t play ball worth the butt

of a benchwarmer.

It was a hook to remember,— 
The slide into second, the wake
Of dust beneath the hanging

Glove of Bobby Petrillo, its pocket

Filled with baseball,— the tip of the sneaker

Hooking the bag's right-field corner in a move
As slick as lubricant.

Ragonesi, you bum!

Now the wound,

The slide's last testament,

Stings like the tail-

End of an angry wasp

As I hobble across the infield

To the backstop where

From the bubbler of the fountain

The coolness of water

Is palmed to the wound's raw flesh 

And the game is paused like a silent
Stretch splitting the 7th.

Quequechan, 1953

-Number 12-

On the first of May, 1947, Evelyn McHale, 23,

walked toward her immediate mission in life into the vast 

lobby of the Empire State Building taking an express elevator

to the observation deck on the 86th floor.

She was dressed to go out.––

Observers at the street scene found it remarkable

that her body was still intact after falling 1,050 feet,

impacting upon the roof of an idling Cadillac limousine.    

But it wasn’t.

Her kid gloves were spotless, still clutching the strung pearls
gracing her neckline, but––
her body began to fall apart when coroner's attendants

tried to lift her from the buckled palm of the limousine's roof

due to the near liquefaction of her internal structure on impact.

Her torso sank away like a punctured bladder, dissolved beneath her dress.

There is postmortem evidence of this

on file at the Coroner’s office of New York City.

It was also reported as confirmed to be that way

with on-sight testimony of the 12th jumper's removal, that which
remained of the lifeless form left behind by Evelyn McHale.