The Great Jimmy Hoffa Scavenger Hunt

[Todd]

His voice still ghosts as angry static
over the twisted
pair of copper phone lines. You only see
an empty Green Pontiac,
an open driver’s door.
Yet, the steel drums remain full
of possibility, rusting
sentinels in Jersey City landfills. You imagine
Giants Stadium could frame his bones—
as if he cared for childish pursuits
played by that pussy Bobby Kennedy.

We do not see his tears
bleed from statues,
or his face form in a clump
of mashed potatoes, and mistake him
for Abraham Lincoln, or Jesus,
or David Cassidy—as if any of them ascended
from the parking lot of the Machus Red Fox.

This is no skin-scraping, finger-bone-divining séance.
There is no tap we wait to hear.
If you must look to the dead for guidance,
ask Mary Jo, the drowned girl,
to write her prophecy in the grease
trap drippings scrawling
with her limp finger:

That which is dead
will not remain so.
That which is buried
will rise.

~~~


(I did some slight revisions to what was done in the poetry practice).

[billy]

getting rid of the first line works for me.

my nit is the last stanza. it feels i've heard it before, at the end of some overly dramatic horror show on tv.
for me it isn't needed, the poem is better without it.

other than that i found it to be an interesting read that flows well. some of the images are perfect and i love the second to last verse.
for me it's one of the best poems i've seen from you.

thanks for the read.

[Todd]

Thanks Billy,

So, you think it could end on finger? I guess it could work if I put a them in front of the with. Let me give that some thought. I'm thinking about also introducing JFK's assassination before Mary Jo...If I pull the end I may put the other stuff in.

Much Appreciated,

Todd

[addy]

I loved this. The setup in the first verse was outstanding, and just the idea of this was packed with so much character it left me grinning. I think the end part is needed (that's the point!)... but if you want it can be written in a way (language?) that's more in-keeping with the character of these urban ghosts.

[billy]

that would work, as it is, it feels like been there seen that.

if you could word it to match the piece as an epitaph maybe. it is nice to see a poem polished by the writer,

[heslopian]

I don't know who Jimmy Hoffa is, though I've heard the name somewhere, but the mark of a good poem, I think, is that it can be enjoyed on some level even if the topic isn't familiar to all. This is one such poem. The images were great, the first line was a gem, and the penultimate stanza contained that nice brooding horror which appears in a lot of your verse.
I have just one small nit: the last stanza, as Billy said, seems a tad cliche, and overly dramatic when you consider the tough, streamlined, down-to-earth diction of the previous lines.
Other than that though, great work.

[Todd]

Thank you Jack. I appreciate your kind comments. I'm reconsidering the end of the poem (I'm reading a 400+ book from the 60's on Hoffa and Kennedy and will be adding more stanzas once I'm done with the research).

Much appreciated,

Todd