here’s how I see it

at my Uncle Octavio’s wake

with the stench of death and floral perfumes

wafting into the nostrils of those in attendance

with the Grim Reaper holding his rusty

previously used reaper sneering as a conqueror

like Napoleon before his fall at Waterville, or

Water View Heights, or whatever it was,–– or the guy

holding a queen-high straight in hearts before a jack-high flush

in spades hits the table diluting his pride, or the incomparable

Maria Bonasera as I drove her around town to all her places of interest,

playing me for a sucker, and in my oldman’s slightly used Pontiac

Chieftain for chrissakes! and that’s how I see it.

  

                   the march of time

darkness had set its face across

the outside of life so I guess I was sleeping.

but this much I know; I know I wasn't screaming.

I don’t scream in my sleep, not that I’d be aware of such a thing,

and besides, no one has made accusations.

anyway, I'm certain that’s something to be reported to the authorities.

alas! my bedroom door flew open, and it got hot under the covers.

I asked of the intruder: “who the hell are you”?!

ashen-faced he cried aloud about the suffering of humanity,

so I surmised it was an angel sent to me to report the skinny

on the goings on of the neighborhood.

nope. y’know who it was? It was Herbie Oglevee Morrison!

and man, I gotta tell ya,–– that’s a guy who knew

how to belt-out a story!

                   to you that I've loved

in you I feel the miracle of a day’s beginning,

the birth of two worlds, one of grapes, one of cloth,

and in that combination I find my residence;

in the scent of obsession; the fragrance of irresistible perfume.

and why did you call my name when I had no right to be there?

Last lunch with Leonard Dufresne

––Historically memorable are 8 with the works to travel

at “Moby's Coney Island" from the steamy troughs behind the counter,

4 for me and 4 for Dufresne, in New Bedford, Massachusetts.

Art students in 1966. We knew how far our stomaches could run.

––Most recently in July of 2023 the first stop on his "farewell tour"

found us at the “Cove Restaurant” in the city of our births set along

the running Taunton below the hill of Fall River, Massachusetts

in the shadows of sweltering textile mills, and the lingering 

echoes of Sarah and Andrew Borden when on August of 1829:

               “Lizzie Borden took an axe

               and gave her mother 40 whacks

               and when she saw what she had done

               she gave her father 41”.

––At the “Cove” I ordered fish and chips;–– haddock,

the sweet, flakey catch-of-the-day gathered

from the nets of the stern-fishers out of New Bedford.

Leonard ordered cherrystone clams followed by

oysters on the half-shell; slimy little delicacies 

which made Dufresne moan in the ecstasy of a man in love,

and the best way to say “goodby” to a life-long friend is don’t,

and simply let the man eat.