Last Minute Gift Ideas for the Cheating Ex-
a bullet with her/his name on it
a bullet with the other bastard/bitch’s name on it
a bullet with your name on it
(who said jealousy can’t be funny?)
or
if you’re feeling clever and sobriquet
you could give the collected set.
Joe Dolce
Chicago Typewriter
Great-granddaddy of the
AK-47 aka Chicago Piano
Organ Grinder Trench Broom
Chopper Tommy
the Anti-Bandit Gun
favoured for its ergonomics
wooden furniture parts
.45 calibre type C drum magazine
designed by General John T Thompson
for World War I (which ended
before production began)
early models offered to the public
suffered poor sales priced at 200 dollars
compared to 400 for a Model-T
first serious customers US Postal Service
Mafia Irish Republic Greek Gendarmerie
infamous during Prohibition (yes the ones in violin cases)
mass-produced for World War II
saw action in Tobruk the Greek Civil War
in the 1948 Arab-Israeli Conflict
the Chicago Typewriter was carried by both sides
one sold at auction in 2012 for 130,000 dollars
previous owners Bonnie & Clyde.
Joe Dolce
Overextended Family
My uncle was a gambler
he opened the boot of his new ’57 Ford
showed ten-year-old me the green suitcase
of one hundred new decks
of playing cards seals unbroken
his daughter my first cousin married
someone crazy no-good
one day after a domestic
he unloaded his shotgun through
the trailer door killing her
his oldest son drunk
and mouthing off at a family lunch
was decked by my eighty-year-old father
who knocked him out with one punch.
Joe Dolce
Petrolhead Zen
after Gary Snyder
Drinking the neck and shoulders
off a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red
cleaning and sharpening the chainsaw
there is no other life.
Joe Dolce
Shuffleboard
Sawdust sprinkled floors smelling of spilt lager
grown ups sitting on swivel stools
the bar lit fairground-bright
spirit bottles toy umbrellas in triangle glasses
red Maraschino cherry green tooth-picked olive
an uncle owned the beer joint near the negro
railroad tracks my mother and father
brought us kids for Friday night perch dinner
while waiting for meals my favourite time
was playing the room length 22-foot shuffleboard
a smooth slick narrow table top shooting polished
steel hockey puck discs down a waxed surface
unknowingly sliding time
in 15th Century England it was groat
large silver pennies were pushed
during the American Revolution
English soldiers and Colonialists played variations
Knock Off Horse Collar and Crazy Eight
throws included Hangers and Corners
not scoring constituted a Hickey
bets were placed in the Hickey Jar
played in backrooms during the Depression and Prohibition
it left and returned with GIs during WW II
Hollywood embraced it in the fifties
Betty Grable and Harry James had custom-built inlaid tables
hitting or shaking the board was not allowed
shooters kept one foot behind playing surface when sliding
rules required players to shake hands before and after a match
no drinks or cigarettes allowed in hands or mouth while playing
a serious gamer brought his own personalized set of steel pucks
sand once used to speed the board evolved
into fine corn and silicone wax
shuffling became almost extinct during the electronic game age
but is making a slow and steady climb back
Pee Wee Ramos is one of twelve members
inducted into the National Shuffleboard Hall of Fame
some years ago before my father died
he took me back to the old beer joint by the negro tracks
Friday night was still perch night
the local-caught fish was as good as I remembered
the shuffleboard was gone.
Joe Dolce
Souls
Some words form souls
of other words.
In Hawaiian,
Ua—rain—is soul of
Hua—fruit,
Pua—flower.
Ua sounds
the way rain feels,
ooooahhh
Rain falls in Kaua—us,
and Aloha Kaua—
may there be love
between us.
Joe Dolce