MR. MACK & MORE QUESTIONS

MR. MACK

Mr. Mack died the other day.  Mack Lewis

born in 1918 near Richmond,

came to Baltimore in ‘24,

grew up on a rowhouse street in Patterson Park,

knew Polish and Irish as neighbors,

played with the Depression poor,

collected bottles, shined shoes, sold newspapers,

boxed for segregated Douglas High, 

joined the army, fought for them too, 

discharged, took a day job with the government,

then, spent nights with his love.

For more than 50 years, 6 nights a week,

climbed those 20 steps at Eager and Broadway,

walked past the sign he posted,

No drugs. No drinking. No smoking. No cursing.

saw thousands come to him to learn,

trained those boys in the art of boxing,

taught respect, how to become a man,

yelled, Stick the jab, counter with the hook,

saw a fighter become world champion, 

another die in the ring, one to jail for murder, 

one named Boogie become a millionaire,

another become a famous artist,

kept thousands off the streets of temptation,

watched his gym crumble, a new one built in his name,

heard the praise of a president and a mayor,

loved as a father figure by some,

respected as a godfather by others,

viewed as an icon in Baltimore,

died November 12, 2010.

Mr. Mack always said,

the gym, This is where I belong.

MOSTLY WE DO NOT KNOW

If she showed the few cards in her hand,

was it because she’s holding out or has a different deck?

If the man makes his bed and lies in it,

shouldn’t the bed have had a say in the matter too?

If, on the plane, you sat in the seat between want and fear

would you rise in weightlessness?

Do apples always bruise when they fall? 

How about if they fall in love?

If Victoria’s Secret couldn’t sell sex,

what would she do?

Is death really just a mute doorman

with a wry grin?

Is want

the hungry ghost we cannot see?

Is God the 1000 piece puzzle

and you the searcher for the missing pieces?

How did God know to make a child walk

just when he was too heavy to carry?

Holy warfare!  Christ and Christians,

did one really beget the other?

Politicians and holy men,

why is it only one can walk on a bed of lies? 

Have pork barrel politicians and Madison Avenue suits always wanted

the masses happy, numb, dumb, and full of Schlitz and sit-coms? 

Can you ever know what leaves you

when death comes?

Is it possible that all we have are questions,

a leaky lift raft on an endless sea?

Did Moses find the only one,

that burning bush with the answers?

Does thinking really hurt?

If your pen did not know fear of speaking truth,

what would it tell to paper?

What do your wounds sing to you?  Are they like the wood thrush that comes at dusk

to sing his evening song over and again?

If life is a dance,

how do we tell our feet to leave our wallflower’d ways?

FOUR FOR THE SHORE -- EASTERN SHORE OF MARYLAND

ODE TO THE EASTERN SHORE

You wear yourself without pretence,

lie flat without worry for a hill,

cloak yourself in cornfields, an everyday shade of green

burn your grass to a late summer tan,

stand unshuttered in two-story white,

walk your telephone poles down to meet the horizon

dot your roads with produce stands,

graze unworried deer at the edge of fields, and slowly

you carry away the names of your ancestors, Nanticoke and Pocomoke.

Eastern Shore,

you wear boring like a regal mark of beauty.

THE RIVER

Quiet collected

the overhanging canopy,

green that mirrored up on down,

the great northern cypress,

knees held high and pink and dry,

the swamp azalea

that gave itself freely to the fragrance of air.

Quiet gathered in

the skipper that tip-toed

needle-black across the water,

the Prothonotary’s warble,

a golden, sweeted song for the verdant woods.

Quiet embraced

the slow, winding turns --

whispered

Pocomoke.

QUESTIONS THAT CAME IN NOVEMBER

Dad, I wish you were back again

to ask all those little questions

I never got around to asking.

Like today, driving Route 50,

crossing the Choptank, recalling

how you once fished that river.

I think we were in the kitchen

when you brought the fish in, dropped

their cold slabs into the sink. 

I wish you were here again, even

with your back turned to me at the sink

scraping scales, cleaning the catch.

I wouldn’t ask what it’s like

on the other side or even for answers

to this riddled life I’ve yet to sort out.

I’d just want to ask, How was it that

cold, November day?  What did you catch?

Was the captain stern, his word law?

How did you keep your hands warm

handling wet fish?  How was it decided

to end this frigid day of fishing?

Dad, I’d want all the details,

leaving nothing out, all you can remember,

to help me remember.

OFFSHORE KAYAKING

I wanted to tell you how it was that day

how they arrived

shedding the sea from their backs,

rhythmically rising and falling,

offering their shiny, black moon eyes to me

how they rose from the green hold of the sea

barely a fathom or two away,

released held breath,

then slipped sinuously away

then rose again by my side,

or slid under keel, or followed along

with slight twist of tail, and

how it was so magically mysterious.

Like I said, I wanted to tell you

how it was that day and

how it is we sometimes get a glimpse

of delight

ours and maybe another’s.