Trumphant Rust Belt Jungle’s Screaming Souls

Iron ore boat and factory raw sewage wafted by Lake Erie
still summer breezes will become a hot coal mess

during wintertime ice fishing. On shore leave,
my crew never walks past broiling construction sites

without respecting neglected men and women who toil
like Swiss Army knives to eek whatever-it-takes livings.

I cannot always find open water or air labor,
so the missus went back to school, got licensed

to lift spoonfuls of old Mason jar cold oatmeal
through anonymous stroke victims’ stubbly drooped lips

serve the gruel up with a healthy side order of drool.
We imperiled brigands do just enough careful work

to pay the bills mostly. Shortchanging and shortchanged
more than a half century since Cleveland’s last championship

our hardhats are off to St. James plus his Cavs’ lunch bucket
apostles whose underdog storybook revival arisen, vanquished

the crosshairs of Golden State Warrior effete 3-pointarrhea
for one wonderful night. Next morning, those of us unemployed

Buckeyes gather at the union hall, argue whether to go door-to-door
to support Donald’s Make America Great Again campaign

which, according to Team Hillary’s latest private poll, is now neck
and neck with her in the current great battleground of Ohio

before the Republican convention convenes next month
in the city with a cavalier motto, Progress and Prosperity.

 

“Family in Their Backyard” © DL Polonsky

 

Gerard Sarnat is the author of four critically-acclaimed collections: HOMELESS CHRONICLES from Abraham to Burning Man (2010), Disputes (2012), 17s (2014) and Melting The Ice King (2016). Work from Ice King was accepted by over seventy magazines, including Gargoyle and Lowestoft Chronicle, and featured in Songs of Eretz Poetry Review, Avocet: A Journal of Nature Poems, LEVELER, tNY, StepAway, Bywords and Floor Plan.

DL Polonsky is a Boston area artist, writer, and filmmaker. His caricatures have appeared in The Boston Herald and His written work includes the children’s book The Letter Bandits from T.B.W. Books.