POETRY MONDAY: January 7, 2013
Jim Kelleher
Happy New Year, everyone! We’re beginning the year with something unusual – parts of a drama in verse, which can be read either as a novel or performed as a play. I do hope we have the opportunity in the near future to see it performed, because it’s quite wonderful.
Poet Jim Kelleher has managed, in this tour de force called Mick: A Celestial Drama, (Antrim House, 2011), to channel the voice of a homeless Viet Nam veteran, who lives in a Maytag box at 109th St. and Amsterdam Avenue on Manhattan’s West Side and tells us his story.
Kelleher’s own story is that he holds an MFA from New England College, teaches literature and composition at Northwestern Community College in Winsted, Conecticut, works in a group home to support three handicapped men, and is also a self-employed carpentry contractor. In former lives he was a teacher in the Boston public schools, caretaker for a summer camp, and a theater usher. His first poetry collection, Quarry, was published by Antrim House in 2008.
One other good thing to note about Jim Kelleher: He has been donating and will continue to donate his author’s share of the proceeds of this book, which can be ordered from www.AntrimHouseBooks.com., to the homeless.
The sections below, the Prologue and two poems, will give you a taste, but I hope you will aid this splendid effort by ordering the book to read in full.
Irene Willis
Poetry Editor
MICK: A CELESTIAL DRAMA
PROLOGUE
Dear Audience
(Mick is alone before drawn curtain. As is the case at the
start of each poem, an angel in white announces the title.)
I never planned to scribble a play
in verse. No shit – I barely survived
high school English. There’s nothing
schooly about me.
Then screams
from horny wife and two brats
drove me past the Edge, smack
into Smirnoff. Homeless, one-handed,
(Enter Ortiz)
I was found out by beat cop Ortiz –
he kept watch on my cardboard.
(Enter Richie)
My boy Richie appeared in dreams.
His red head ruined my sleep. DTs.
(Enter Saint Peter and Billy Gorilla)
Saint Peter? And Billy Gorilla?
I can’t explain this narrative,
(Enter Lucille and Maureen)
not Lucille’s laments, our troubled
colleen Maureen, pregnant,
not the hidden baseball cards
and flashbacks I had along the way.
I had sabotaged and quit my family,
my blues chalked on subway cars.
Holocaust may descent on all of us –
ice caps melting, AIDS, Arabia flaming.
It’s enough to make me slug a triple scotch.
But put your drug of choice aside
and please, review my story –
the keening of a dad’s heart,
my son’s disaster, our search, and 9-11.
The action goes down in New York City
and Heaven, two impossible places.
Thanks be to God and Yogi Berra.
(All exit.)
Mick Monahan’s Odyssey
(Set: 109th Street. Mick crawls from his Maytag box, points
and gesticulates toward Officer Ortiz, who towers over him in
his blue uniform, shining his flashlight at Mick and at the
inscription “Home of Champions” painted on the box in sloppy
black capital letters. A raggy backpack and pint bottle lie
outside the box.)
His black shoes kick my blue hand and I cough
blood and phlegm. My froze-up fingers curl
outside the cardboard. I was sleeping one off
in a Maytag washer crate, bothering no one,
snoring oldies but goodies like an iPod.
Then Blue Man comes and busts my dream,
my snowy, tinsel, Christmas dream –
Gram roasts a turkey, a clove ham with pineapples.
She serves big steamy bowls of green beans.
My older sister Maureen shrieks. She feeds me
Hershey Candy Kisses. Mom has framed
my first grade Holy Cross photos and Santa surprises me
with a rare Mickey Mantle bubblegum card.
I collect Yankees and dodgers in shoeboxes.
(Mick opens the shoebox at his feet, looks at several baseball
cards. Then he secretively returns the shoebox to his pack.)
Then Cop tells me to show my driver’s license
and I tell him to fuck off. I sold m Dodge Dart
before they made it Daimler-Benz. Who the fuck
is Daimler? Who is Benz? I am Slammin’ Mick
Monahan, grew up right here on 109th Street,
Amsterdam Avenue, Manhattan. Spanish Harlem
to you, stupid. Why don’t you leave me alone?
I am block stickball champ! I can hit three
manhole covers! I broomstick Spaldeens so hard
I split ‘em in half! I shatter fourth-story
windows – I am King of Ground-Rule Doubles!
I rammed a a pink rubber rocket that ricocheted
off a yellow Checker and stuck right in the grate
of this black subway vent! Jesus, I got no wallet.
(Mick rummages in his pockets for his wallet, then begins to
nod off. Officer Ortiz nudges Mick’s hand with his black shoe.)
Cop keeps kicking my bluefish hand, waking me.
I advise him sleeping in public sucks, but it’s safe.
Kings and Sinners won’t bust me up or torch me.
Do I want a shelter? I was robbed in one. Homer
had his ship, I say. This cardboard box is good for me.
(Sarge enters.)
Then his Sergeant yells, “Arrest him!” But he don’t.
“He belongs in a shelter,” says NYPD 1831 Ortiz.
The blue and white paddy wagon pulls right on my curb.
Sarge arrests me. He’s no jolly Saint Nick, but
the jail bus is warm. I wave adios to Officer Ortiz.
I close my eyes and I remember Moose Skowron,
Elston Howard, Hank Bauer’s rifle arm. I see Mickey
and Yogi hitting home runs off the foul pole.
I taste sweet potatoes and cranberries, and I am home.
The Tombs
(A sign reads ‘The Tombs.’ In his cell, Mick speaks to
himself wistfully, looks up as he mentions his kids.)
I smell like shit and vomit when I wake.
I’m a booze lump – itchy junkies don’t touch me.
Crackheads and smackers, pimps and fag queens
don’t touch me. I sleep on my coat, my pack is my pillow.
Richie, I dream of you and your coke-sucking mom
and little Mo, my baby Maureen. Oh sweetie …