Uncle Moscow
by Bill Yarrow
He asked me to bury him in Reno.
Instead, I had him cremated in Trenton.
But I did hang his dog tags on a high bough
of an alder tree outside the Frontier Hotel.
The last time I saw him was in an assisted-
living facility in Pennsauken. He stuck out
a wine-dark tongue and punched me
in the chest. Poor one-eyed Uncle Moscow—
blinded when a fruit fly flew into his eye,
nonplussed when two hitchhikers sitting
in his backseat smacked his balding head
with a ball-peen hammer and stole his car.
He had a mind like a whorehouse martini, but
does that negate the leverage of a man's heart?
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Author's Note
A version of this poem appeared on December 13, 2010, in Everday Genius, guest edited by Chloé Cooper Jones.
This poem appears in my chapbook FOURTEEN (Naked Mannekin, 2011) and in Blasphemer (2015).
Solid music in the lines, Bill. Good character piece.
Solid music in the lines, Bill. Good character piece.
Brains, emotion, AND muscle.
(makes for a handsome poem)
...and still not a sonnet. You know I love this.
Nice one, Bill. This FOURTEEN yields much goodness.
A great character, richly specified.
There are some guys who are just not going to get through life without a ball-peen hammer to the balding head.Blinded by a fruit fly! Enjoyed this a lot, Bill!
Your "Uncle Moscow" and my uncle Basil would eviscerate the shit out of this world. Basil once sewed his lips shut with needle and thread, claiming some sort of yoga-type power of concentration. Enjoyed this piece very much.
The poetry, poet, characterization, musical rhythms: I like.
hilarious
"He had a mind like a whorehouse martini, but
does that negate the leverage of a man's heart?" Rhetorical question, I suspect. *