Just Call Me Joe





Joe Cardarelli was the one that got me started.

Blame him.

Grizzly bear poet
With his black and white hair and beard.

“Just call me Joe”
He said.

I didn’t know it until later
But he was a little off.

He would’ve had to have been
To convince me to take his poetry class
In college.

I didn’t know dick about poetry.

But there I was
In his class
For not just one year
But several
Until I graduated.

My stuff was real dark
With a biting black sense of humor.

Ironic
Considering
That whenever possible
His class was conducted outside
In the grass.

In the sunshine.

Peace, love and happiness.

Sometimes wine was poured
Or a beer was opened.
Cigarettes were burned
Down to their filters.

“Just call me Joe”
Had a lean to
In the woods
Somewhere
In Bumfuck, Maine.

It had an outhouse.

He would constantly
Tell us
How much he liked to stay up there.

NOBODY else around.

He talked about it as he would a lover.

I laid back in the lazy sun
Eyes closed
From the mandatory
‘Pre-class’ joint
And listened to others
Picked by Joe
Read their
Poems.

We were a motley crew.

Through the orange flesh
Of my eyelids
I could picture Joe

“Just call me Joe”

Bypassing
The wooden shithouse
Pissing stoically
Amidst
The Spruce, Balsam
Fir and Hemlock.

Plumes of hot breath
Coming out of him
As he pissed undisturbed
Thinking of nothing else
Except the beauty and simple peace
Around him
While
Words and poetry
Tumbled
Through
His grizzly bear brain.