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Funeral Lillies

They repair worn and withered flowers in the annex next to the arcade. If you take your time, you can straighten out their creases. Whether it’s real or imagined, whenever you cultivate your vices, you run the risk of winding up a feature in a gossip column. Or drifting in the personal ads.

Thanks to St. Jude for the favors that were granted.

A certain type of book is not permitted in the Public Library. The works of Tennessee Williams, Wild West Comics, and anything titled with words about Paris or any form of darkness. Banned from the shelves are provocative picture books of hula girls, who shake and shimmy day in and day out.

Thanks to St. Jude for favors granted.

The most famous kinsman among you recently passed away. Everybody and his brother will pay their respects. Funny, when you think of it, how can you get around it? His words used to thrill a captive audience, words like redolent and serene. If there were no words left over, simply out of breath, he’d use every trick in the book to regain them.

At his funeral, you’ll have the chance to introduce yourself to kings. Gladhand brazenly. Kings who rule over entire domains, real or imagined. My Father pointed out a beefy redfaced man, and said, ‘Go over and shake hands with Mr. Mayor!’ He was talking with others from the parish and he wheeled around after I tapped his shoulder. The smell of alcohol was on his breath. He looked at me, I told him my name. He grabbed my hand and muttered ‘Mike Igoe’s kid’. He turned back to what he was doing.

The mayor enjoys the sight of grandstand bunting. Festoons red, white, and blue. He hired out-of-work vagabonds to form his cheering section. The crowd stretches the length of the Boulevard. It was sealed off with sawhorses. Bobbing and weaving, these vagabonds wave their arms, and clap on time while he’s giving his speech.

Somehow my father convinced him to come along for the ride to the Hot Dog Pit on 79th. I was under no illusion about the power they both wielded there. The precinct captains are regulars at lunchtime. John Gibbons and Eddie Staley feared my father because he was on a first-name basis with the mayor and everyone in the Mayor’s Office. Eddie Staley was an old geezer who took in Johnny Vaughn, his orphaned nephew. Johnny was older than me by a few years. He raised homing and passenger pigeons behind a chicken-wire enclosure. They routinely took flight from his rooftop. I was amazed that they found their way back.

It was good of Mr. Staley to take Johnny under his wing.

Soon comes another Veteran’s Day. We hope we’ll hit the heights, making time by saving time. We’ll start with a death blow to the New Breed from the Old Guard and take it from there. At the end of the day, we’ll come up with a new plan, force everybody to abide by it. A slow introduction to the modified regime. Old socks, new shoes; just a rerun of a command performance. Much like The Changing of the Guard. The same face in the mirror they see every day will be the one they return to before they sleep. It’s like they say, only the names will be changed to protect the innocent.

We’re all much older now. Last winter, Dad started to cough up red gravy from one lung, then the other. He should quit smoking, just like he quit going to church.

Before he passed, he left me with these words of wisdom: there are a few things you should remember: gold is where you find it. In debt you come into the world, and in debt you go. The rich have their money, and the poor have their children. We have no time to second-guess what we do; the swift and the strong never waver.’

About the artist

Michael Igoe, city boy, neurodiverse, Chicago now Boston. Works appear in journals and anthologies available at amazon.com, lulu.com, barnesandnoble.com. National Library of Poetry Editor’s Choice Award 1997. Best of the Net nomination 2003.