-There's a deep hole at Short-

When his son singled on a grounder

Through the hole between third and short

In the Pee-Wee League of Columbus Park

In the Summer of 1969,

Albert Bernard would have smiled broadly,

Clapping his hands with exuberant pride.

Had he lived. Had the child been born.

Had he lived,

His son would have looked his way,

Standing on the bag at first,

Uniform a full-size too big,
Helmet half-way down his face,

Eyes wide as baseballs.

Had he lived.

Had his Son been born.

Had Albert simply ducked.

Had he seen it coming.

Had the ball dropped an inch

To simply bruise his jaw.

Had his girl pressed closer

For another moment

Behind the Billboards

Causing him to be late for the game

Causing him to pedal fast to the Park

Fast from the street,

Spikes flung over his shoulders,
Glove threaded through the handlebars,

Causing the Coach

To bench him for his tardiness;

For his irresponsibility

To his waiting teammates.
Had he just been late.

In the Summer of 1958,

Albie Bernard got beaned at Ruggles Park.

But he shook it off.

He walked it off and we patted him on the ass

For being a ballplayer, for staying in the game,

Unaware of how briefly

We were spared his death by a baseball.

But he died the next day in an early

Morning ambulance

Whining loud and fast down Bedford Street

Toward Union Hospital in a quest

To keep him with us; with his friends,

His teammates and with the girl
Who danced with him on Friday nights.

Now his Grandmother

Wails grief-sick at the grave
Held limply standing by attendants:

"Albert, don't leave your Mother!"

“Albert, don’t leave your Mother!”

Now his teammates grieve at the grave,
Silently beside themselves.

With Father Vincent Diafario assisting,
Monsignor Joseph Pannoni
Measured his cadence

Through the written passage of the antiphon.

Casket is sprinkled in water.

Casket is perfumed in smoke.

The silence creaks like a clearing in the woods.
More poignant are the sobs and clearing

Throats of the grieved.
There are whispers to his Mother's ear.
They shelter her palms in their hands.
We linger not knowing what it is we should do.

So we wait. And we wait.
And then we went to breakfast.

It’s where the ballplayers belong,

Crowded into the Diner’s booth,

Pressed together as one body

Replaying the moment in our heads,—

The moment the ball struck Albie’s.

The baseball is pushed from the knuckler's

Fingertips and it floats to the batter hypnotically.

In the quiet booth, Paul Pieroni’s eyes

Looked like the baseballs he pitched;—

The stitches advance nearly without movement

When the Knuckleball floats.

It wouldn't have hit him.

It comes in too slow.

Albie's too quick.

I quietly wished a Knuckler had thrown the ball.

A Knuckleballer like Pieroni.

But someone's inshoot, high, fast and tight

Tailed-in to find its mark.

There's a deep hole at Short.  

Frankie Teixeira played Third Base

Thinking he was Frank Malzone;—

Tough and smart and slow. Great glove.

Talked the infield like a poet:

“Hum baby, hum you kid, hum baaaabe.”

Homered in a win against Saint Anthony of Padua,

The Church three blocks down the street

But on another Planet.

Albie danced the way we danced,

Right arm wrapped around her waist,

Left hand opened for her hand,

Mouth to her cheek,— she floated on air

Like the knuckleball floats.

His young wife has the eyes of the girl;

Is cradling his son in her ams,

Kissing him goodbye in the morning.

Time for work. Time to support his family.

Had he lived.

Had his girl become his wife and given him his son.

There's a deep hole in life.

On second, “Ducky” Cavalho

Once dropped a popup,

To lose a game in extra innings,

The ball still falling silently, far in the distance.

The diner's booth is closing in on us.

Teddy “Blue” Dicorpo held down First.

From Albie to Ducky to Blue.

There’s a deep hole at Short.

Albie wasn’t College material.

Not many of us were.

We heard of a kid from Holy Name

They said was invited to try-out for the Red Sox.

I played Left Field.
I couldn't hit with power

But ran fast and bunted
With reasonable accuracy.

When they chanted “No batta, No batta..”

They weren’t thinking bunt.

There's a deep hole at Short.

Lionel Morrais was our Center Fielder.

Long and lanky, “Leaping Lee-Lee”

In any street-game played
By the neighborhood of friends

Which required speed and an ability to jump,—

Peggyball, Bowl-a-Wicket, Buck-Buck,

Lionel was mined from the pick-ups
Like he was gold.

Now he sat to my right in the Diner's booth

Trying like hell to talk to Pieroni.

“Albie was hit by a pipe when he was a kid,

Remember? Paulie,.. remember?"

This was an invention used to assuage

Our collective sorrow, as if something else,

Anything else but a baseball caused Albie’s death;

As if something else, anything else

Would make some sense.

Oh, had there been the fantom pipe
To temper our guilt

But Paul Pieroni, Knuckleballer,
Will cling to it through life.

When Tommy Curry wasn’t playing Right Field,

He pitched in the rotation behind Paul.

He twice struck out the mighty “Chicker” Machado

In a close loss to Immaculate Conception.

I always found it strange that Tommy

Didn’t hang-out on the corner with the rest of us,

Believing that anybody who could, would.

She'd glide in her dress, bare-footed.

She'd pause when he'd pause in the warm

Embrace of the dance: "Goodnight Sweetheart," and slide

Her foot on the hard-wood floor, pulling his foot

To follow in her lead.

There's a deep hole in life.  

John “Pappy” Tacovelli was the consumate Catcher.

Rough, hard-skinned and constantly bruised.

His Mother, Carmella, swore like a trooper, and
Chain-smoked Camel cigarrettes

Which hung with a wet duck’s-ass from her mouth.

The fast-ball was favored by coach Gino DiNucci

As the pitch of preference to Pieroni’s

On-going consternation.

Smart, right-minded,

Uncompromising in his devotion to his team,

Like baseball coaches used to be,

Although Pieroni and his knuckleball

Held fast to the starting rotation with the best
Won/Lost record two years running.

For the Holy Rosary baseball team
Of the city's CYO League,

There's a deep hole at Short.

In the Summer of 1958,

Albert Bernard, “Albie,”

In Fall River, by cause of a baseball,

Died after being hit
On the right temple of the head.

He leaves behind

A loving Mother,

A Brother and Sister,

His Grandmother, grief-sick.

He leaves his Teammates.

He leaves behind

The girl of his arms,

His wife and their child,—
Had that he lived.

There's a deep hole in life.

He leaves behind

An infielder's glove, olive-oiled,
Hand-rubbed and ready,

Threaded through the handlebars.

He leaves behind

This singular romance of himself:

Bernard, Albert, “Albie.”

In Fall River.
All Star.

Shortstop.

Bats right.

Throws right.

Quequechan

  

   

-notation-

notating that the outside atmosphere

carried with it the same fragrances
which saturated the inside;
the scent of metal and water;

the warm bread shuttled
from the ovens of the bakeries,

the significant odor of leaded gasoline
and the broader

expansion in the perfumes of the dressers;

the beaten baseball, damp from the rainfall

in the twilight of last night's game
waiting at the kitchen table;

the aromas of sweet tomato sauces
duplicated

over the cracked and weeding
tarmac of the playground, wafting
from window to window; the chalk-
dust of the afternoon's arithmetic

coating our nostrils;

the day's gatherings in close quarters
face to face; where the entries

are the links to everything,

street crossing to street crossing,

each with its atmospheric distinction

and if I have to begin someplace, I’ll begin here.

                                                 Quequechan

-twilight time-

In search of the lost 

poetry of Quequechan

the sweetness of its early stage

the rainwater telling its history
on the summer street

the warmth of air over the puddles

the scent of metal in them—

the schoolyard’s drenched 

activity

the playground’s consumption

the pitch 

the stance the readiness

of the grip

the hunt for the girls 

who never ran for cover

who graced the intersections
who clung to our sides
against the odds

against the will of their fathers—

who moved better than anything
who dressed for the kill 
on Friday nights

the scent of Windsong

caressing their hair; 

the scent of metal in the water—

the stance, the readiness
in the grip—

the music and the slow-

shuffled movement of the dance.

                                  Columbus Park

-Closures and beginnings-

It's Autumn, the back

door to November, and it clings

like the maple leaf at its weary fist.

I’m not expecting anything, but
simply considering what I want to do

won’t get it done,

and getting it done won't make it right.

I'm gathering information

from the wake of what's been left behind.

It's Autumn, the back

door to November, where

it's in the flotsam, the stories are found.

November 1, 2012

  

-aphorism-

what is the nature of the idiom

or

what if it comes undone

as the cloth's weave when the errant

thread is pulled from it

or

how does it spend its time?

is the foundation of storytelling the same

as its history's structure

in that

the capstone is beautiful

the tie-stone strong?

2/13/12

-the mystery ride-

Let's hit the road.

To leave by car

We must enter the car.

Two doors and the front seats

Tilt forward to assist easy access
From the outside to the backseat.

Sometimes on the driver's side

The tilting seat will cause the horn to blow.

One slip-up could tipoff the cops.

Four doors and it’s every man

For himself.

Let's live the two-door life.

A life of two doors.

We're on our way.

Four doors and from
The open back window

The flat tongue of the dog 

Flaps through the air in its sparks of spit

Splattering the trunk;

The simple vacation of its summer days.

Two doors and in the evening
The Moon is all it could be.

She dials-in a smokey Platters tune,

they asked me how I knew
my true love was through

Climbing over to the backseat bench

She knows how it's done,—

Her petticoats whistle 

Across the naugehyde under
The headliner's yellowing domelight.

She bounces on purpose twice or more

Closer to the Galaxy's

Cockeyed fins in the only

Way to make them functional.

I of course replied,
when the lovely flame dies,
smoke gets in your eyes.

To leave by car

We'd enter the car.

The mystery ride.

A two-door life.

A life of two doors.

We'd hit the road, pair by pair

To the place where it stopped;

when the deep purple falls
over sleepy garden walls
and the stars begin to twinkle in the sky
for as long as my heart will be
sweet love will always be
here in the deep purple dreams

And moonlight beamed.

              

                          Quequechan

-at the Hugo A. Dubuque School-

1.

The turtle is turned on its back

Upon the asphalt of the schoolyard.
The turtle inverted has four useless legs
And its time is running out.

This is the age of death's exploration.

Killing creatures
Was a rite of passage for the boys;

Grasshoppers to the webs of the widows,

Toothpicks through the ladybugs,—
Squishing caterpillars beneath the soles
Of our sneakers,— tossing

Hornworms into the wacky throngs of red ants

Climbing over one another for a taste,
Tattle-tailing,
Waving their antennae, knocking heads,—

Displaying their intelligence.

The wackiest kid
Got his hands on a magnifying glass

And any slow-mover
Was doomed to the needled-ended
Spike of the Sun.

On their knees at the carnage,
The boys laugh like lunatics

Elbowing each other at the first
Crackling spit of bug-smoke

As the girls, their delicate arms folded
Just above the waistlines of the crisp
Day-dresses, lean on the high,
Over-the-head chain linked fence,
Blank-faced and anticipating.

2.
There’s a famous 1940s photograph

Of a drowned man sprawled on the beach

At Coney Island, surrounded by a semicircle
Of grey-faced onlookers in high-waisted
Bathing-suits as a few attendants fail
In their struggle to release him
Back into the sea of the living.

His young wife, kneeling in the sand
Next to his dead head,

Realizes the still-shot camera at the ready,
And smiles broadly as the shutter clicks
To document the scene.

She smiles because it’s instinctive for her to do so

Whenever a camera is poised in her direction.

The schoolyard girls observing the brutality
Of life and death at the fence near the tarmac
Are as engaged, but colder;

Austere at the moment of the truth.

3.

The Maypole stands for the school's
Mayday festivities

And the alternating boys and girls,
Dressed-up,
Starched and serious are walking
In a slow circle around it.
They hold in their hands, pole-attached strips
Of crepe paper;
Red white and blue, marching like benign
Circus creatures,
Corkscrewing the pole, delighting the audience
Of parents and teachers in attendance.

From the open doors of the red-brick building,
Down the granite stairway, each flight worn in the middle,
The electrical extension cord winds its way outward
To where the appropriate fanfare trumpets upon a folding table
From the portable record player.

                                                    Quequechan

-Elementals-

Into Saturday evening
And the ravioli are hand-made, the edges
Fork-pressed and in a bedroom vacated for the night,

A laundered top-sheet covers the double bed,
Is flour-dusted ready to receive them.

This is where the ravioli rest
As they harden overnight, a process
Necessary to hold the edges together 
When submerged into water.

The streetlights are on

So they won’t let us go outside.
Our mothers kept time
By the streetlight activations

And before our passion for exploration
Broke from their roots, we played outside
Close enough to home

That a mother’s call was clearly recognized.

When the streetlights came on
The names of the kids reverberated
Throughout the neighborhood.

In the evening from the kitchen window, the park

Looked cold, bluer, like a giant
Outer planet longing to be populated.

That’ll be our job in the morning.
And from the bedroom's top-sheet,

The ravioli wait their turn to enter the water.

                                         Quequechan

-Left behind-

I held back for a moment

Allowing the mourners to shuffle out;

Soft-talking, respectful smiles,

Handshakes all around as if congratulating

One another on their ability to survive. 

We’d decided on a closed casket

With a framed 8x10 glossy standing

On the lid at the head.

I think it’s the head.

The twenty year old air-brushed color pic

Has him sitting healthy, smiling and leaning

Forward at a severe angle, typical 

To studio portrait photography.

Maybe I should have opted for the Extreme

Measures alternative.

He’d be beeping away in a warm sleep

In the starchy room where I left him to die.

He travelled the distance necessary
Selling the company’s booze everyday

Miles from home where the ocean is,
Where the restaurants thrived in summer
Then shuttered his sales in winter
Returning home through the seasons
Dropping his heavy keys in the milk-
Glass saucer kept for them at the door.

He bequeathed to me

His corner across the active
Street where we lived;

The platitudes of his relations;
The unrealistic assertions of linking
Almost everything I did
For years to come, with him.
He bequeathed to me his half-
Measure of my birth and my youth.

I said: "We'll take this one".

It’s not the most expensive.
It's the least expensive.
It's bronze-colored.
Others were tantalizing,
Whispered as built of exotic woods.
I held back for a moment.

But in the end, I didn’t think
We should waste the money.

                                    Fall River