Joe Dolce: ‘Seven Words’, ‘The Murder of Alberta King’ and ‘Old Person’s Friend’

Seven Words
for Les Murray

Self-addressed stamped envelope pigeons home.
Tear it open!
Poetry editor’s comment:
sorry I can’t like any of these …

Ah—so why do I feel empowered
reading those seven familiar words,
more so than acceptances by most other editors?
Better to be abused than ignored,
a habitually mistreated friend once told me?
Emphatic NO to this.
Even a rejection from LM
is a hand-up, a rise, a lift.
Not a knock, but a nudge,
to keep scribbling—
standing, falling, standing
in the gravity-fight of language.

More than the cliché of tough love,
an archery instructor grasping
an apprentice’s bow-hand,
elevating it slightly.

Never typed, always handwritten,
often postcards,
from an endless collection.

Now imagine the feeling
opening the mail:

I’m taking this one.

Joe Dolce

The Murder of Alberta King

Slain in church while she was praying,
in thought, and words, let us recall,
the murder of Alberta King.

Six years before, she felt the sting,
in Memphis, saw her poor son fall.
Slain in church, while she was praying,

the congregation heard them ring:
six shots—the killer fired them all,
and murdered sweet Alberta King.

Eyes closed, she had finished playing
The Lord’s Prayer, from her organ stall,
slain in church while she was praying,

her husband near her, worshipping,
smoke, from the pistol, left a pall
o’er the murdered Alberta King.

Marcus Chenault fired, while standing,
in nineteen-seventy-four. Recall,
slain in church while she was praying,
the murder of Alberta King.

Joe Dolce

Old Person’s Friend

Two centuries ago, before antibiotics,
pneumonia was death.
Doctors, on house calls, tinctured
laudanum; peaceful passing
arrived within a week.

Sir William Osler coined the nickname
embraced by grandparents, too old
to farm, in pain, or a burden.

Nowadays, super-drugs
prolong age, suffering, burden,
but pneumonia, a pathogenic team sport,
with over 23 variants of Streptococcus alone,
is no longer a friend to comfort.

Joe Dolce