Steel City Christmas. By Greg Clary

                                                                         

Having a fish sandwich

and Iron City at

Pittsburgh’s oldest bar, the

Original Oyster House.

149 years on the same corner.

No frills, one page menu,

recipes 100 years old.

Cash only.

My wife asks: “Do you

have any Hendicks gin?”

“Nope—Gordons and Gilbey’s.

Tanqueray sometimes.”

It’s the Tuesday night before Christmas.

Outside the door, Pittsburgh’s

seasonal Holiday Village

had taken over Market Square.

Kiosks selling distinctive ethnic

Christmas ornaments fill the area.

Ukranian tree balls, Irish trinity knots,

Bavarian Santa’s, Kenyan soapstone stars.

Behind the bar hangs a huge, faded 

poster of Rocky Marciano, 

with all 49 fights listed

below his Christmas wreathed picture.

Undefeated and still

Heavyweight Champion of the world.

Festooned with colored lights, his right arm back,

ready to knock your ass out.

Stepping back to the restroom,

I hear the bartender say to the cook:

“Hey Jigsy, you fucked up.”

“I fucked up the day I started working here.”

I paused, caught his eye and said

“Merry Christmas, Jigsy.”

He sighed, smirked, and said,

“Merry Christmas, my man.”

Greg Clary is Professor Emeritus of Rehab and Human Services at Clarion University, Clarion Pa.

His poems have appeared in The Rye Whiskey Review, The Watershed Journal, and North/South Appalachia: Poems Vol 1.

His photographs have been published in The Sun Magazine, Looking at Appalachia, Tiny Seed Journal, and The Watershed Journal.

He resides in Sligo, Pennsylvania and is a Son of Turkey Creek, West Virginia.