Rice: Poems

The Goodfellows Club

15 The Goodfellows Club for FX Walker II You are only kissing thirty the younger son of near-extinct men the likes of which we won’t never see again the last of them kind that rolled off the Old Man pan just so mens I can’t save in no other way but this way There are ones who know the difference between everything and just anything who taught a son schooled a daughter by old grey firelight passed from stick to smoky stick Why they must be in their 50s by now I know you seen ’em but don’t know if you knew how much you was looking at Athletes never fallen who always played for the game not the shiny quarter rolling towards them on the ground (quarterbacks couldn’t sneak back then) 16 There was what you were expected to do (because of what you had been given) and there was nothing else your work whatever it was was the everything about you That’s who you the last of and times ain’t changing they gone ain’t no more where you come from Why they must be in their 60s by now Mens who loved poker and cards sweet on dominos and could pop your knuckle and their own just kindly placing a checker on the board they say Joe Louis’s name like it’s the sweet key to the kingdom keep big wooden radios that don’t work covered up with a clean cloth like they do (or might again one day) Jack Johnson and a crying horn breaks they water quicker than a new blade from their medicine chest do their stubbly jaws They love womens and still take themselves a look that way their old necks might rivercrack into another line or two but they wouldn’t yell out a rolled-down window no matter how pretty the face 17 no matter how tight the skirt they’d smile and keep it to themselves or wait till Friday when they always congregate to talk and they’d walk away in a minute before ever lifting a finger wrong in her face Somethings you should still keep to yourself Somethings are still born private They cut hair work with the mail and sold their filling stations for pennies cause Junior got into State and needed this and that They sell insurance and mean it flew air squadrons and remember it love rice and gravy and meet once a year to wear something annual something anybody would want to polish or salute every time they set their wooden eye on it they congregate once a week for a trim at the red-striped swirling pole that still spins for them (don’t you look for them in any mall) They call themselves Goodfellows The Gents Zoophead and Sonny Boy and slap shoulders and palms Some still tap their pocket watches for the correct time they might kiss a brother’s cheek if his cheek needed to be kissed 18 never batting an eye they love each other in the loud of hazy unforgotten days Why they must be in their 70s by now They love a fried anything and won’t eat without bread on the table poke they belly and you better run for cover cause they is all ice tea Football on Sunday but only after church (they ain’t the deacon but they are the whole row) they keep their Seventh Day shirt on all day and somehow never get it dirty just loosen up the collar some to let you know they been to pray for you and back they love their coffee black their eggs fried right don’t leave more than one yellow tear in the skillet if you do eggs for them shake down bushy black trees of pepper Short little big feet mens big high back giant reaching up mens with tarps and canopies for chests steering the same car for twenty-leven thousand years cause they don’t make ’em like they used to and they never buy but one and forever patch up the best one ever and lean back when they drive her like they still only two minutes old 19 and no you ain’t seen nothing like it Deuces Lincolns T-Birds And rattling...