Golden Shovel of John Hoppenthaler’s “The Week After Valentine’s Day”
The old pool hustlers are gone, the real road pool players. How
Many ghosts in those roadside honky tonks? How many
Dead from diabetes, emphysema, cancer like Russell
AKA Randy who worked the Ohio river bars, or Jessie Stover
Who rode out of Wheeling, a fat heart-shaped
Black man, his touch with a cue light as chocolate
Souffle. So many of them lowered in boxes
Or ditches, unmarked without epitaphs, or interred
In the county home, or prison. Or in
The manger of their minds, the blue
2 ball that hung for the stack on the lights, recycling
All the tattered stories. The unluckiest found in barrels
Along the Ohio river, uncountable wages lining
The pockets of gamblers disguised as working men, our
Nobodies with names like Shorty or Red from hollers & streets
Of unimaginable debts—nights searching for action that
Had no permanent address, & too there was sweetness
Between the honky tonk towns, tough women already
Saying, Come here road man, buy my drinks till your gone.
