Wednesday, February 17, 2021

THE FIRST KISS. By Doug Holder

 


A tipsy old man
gives a kiss to 
his lottery ticket.
Who knows?
it may be his last.
Of course
it might 
have been different.


If it wasn't
for the booze, bullshit, 
and bombast.
Yes there
was actually
a time when
he went out
for a pack of Luckies
and never came back--

the chorus sings:

" Hit the road Jack
and don't come
back no more
no more..."

Yes
he kissed the ticket
he kissed a card
of dead-end dollar signs
each scratch
another lost cause
his hoary head
in love
his eyes
pulled up
the cataract blinds
and revealed
a deep, deep blue...

well,
perhaps....
just like
his first.






Doug Holder is the founder of the Ibbetson Street Press. He teaches creative writing at Endicott College in Beverly, MA. For over thirty years he ran poetry groups for psychiatric patients at McLean Hospital--outside of Boston.


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