Poems About Pool Sharks

POEMS ABOUT POOL SHARKS Shark by Michael R. Burch They are all unknowable, these rough pale men— haunting dim pool rooms like shadows, propped up on bar stools like scarecrows, nodding and sagging in the fraying light... I am not of them, as I glide among them— eliding the amorphous camaraderie they are as unlikely to spell as to feel, camouflaged in my own pale dichotomy... That there are women who love them defies belief— with their missing teeth, their hair in thin shocks where here and there a gap of scalp gleams like bizarre chrome, their smell rank as wet sawdust or mildewed laundry... And yet— and yet there is someone who loves me: She sits by the telephone in the lengthening shadows and pregnant grief... They appreciate skill at pool, not words. They frown at massés, at the cue ball’s contortions across green felt. They hand me their hard-earned money with reluctant smiles. A heart might melt at the thought of their children lying in squalor... At night I dream of them in bed, toothless, kissing. With me, it’s harder to say what is missing... Fair Game by Michael R. Burch At the Tennessee State Fair, the largest stuffed animals hang tilt-a-whirl over the pool tables with mocking button eyes, knowing the playing field is unlevel, that the rails slant, ever so slightly, north or south, so that gravity is always on their side, conspiring to save their plush, extravagant hides year after year. “Come hither, come hither...” they whisper; they leer in collusion with the carnival barkers, like a bevy of improbably-clad hookers setting a “fair” price. “Only five dollars a game, and it’s so much Fun! And it’s not really gambling. Skill is involved! You can make us come: really, you can. Here are your balls. Just smack them around.” But there’s a trick, and it usually works. If you break softly so that no ball reaches a rail, you can pick them off: One. Two. Three. Four. Causing a small commotion, a stir of whispering, like fear, among the hippos and ostriches. Pool's Prince Charming by Michael R. Burch for Louie Roberts Louie, Louie, Prince of Pool, making all the ladies drool... Take the “nuts”? I'd be a fool! Louie, Louie, Prince of Pool. Louie, Louie, pretty as Elvis, owner of (ahem) a similar pelvis... Compared to you, the books will shelve us. Louie, Louie, pretty as Elvis. Louie, Louie, fearless gambler, ladies' man and constant rambler, but such a sweet, loquacious ambler! Louie, Louie, fearless gambler. Sports, pool, billiards