Donal Mahoney- Three Poems

Reading Seamus Heaney

The Second Commandment

is pretty specific: Thou shalt not take 

the Name of the Lord Thy God in vain.

It’s one of the few commandments 

I seldom break but the other night 

I was reading Seamus Heaney

and was torn by the beauty 

ringing in my ears and “Jesus Christ!” 

slipped out of my mouth but I 

don’t think I said His Name in vain.

I spoke in high praise of a poet who 

has left behind a body of work that 

leaves me gasping for a respirator.

But the Second Commandment

is pretty specific so I plan to ask

Father Kelly if my "Jesus Christ!”

while reading Seamus Heaney

was a mortal sin, and if he says yes, 

I’ll be careful reading Heaney again

because if I find better poems

and "Jesus Christ!" slips out again 

I might have a heart attack and die

pajama-clad in my old recliner.

I could wake up ablaze in Hell.

I'll have to be careful reading 

Seamus Heaney again.

Subway Sarah

Sarah works lunch in a Subway shop

building sandwiches for construction men 

putting up a skyscraper down the street.

The men pick their own bread and meat and let 

Sarah pick their cheese because instead of a cookie

with their lunch they’d prefer Sarah after work.

Every month or so the crew changes and Sarah picks 

the man who looks the best, says the nicest things 

and agrees to meet him for coffee later at Starbucks. 

If he passes muster over lattes, Sarah takes him home 

and finds herself an hour later staring at the ceiling while

he pulls on his boots, says he’ll call and goes home. 

None of the men has ever called or is seen again 

except at Subway where he now picks his own cheese. 

Old-Timer’s Disease

Under his pillow he keeps

a pistol not to shoot the man

coming through the window

with a bazooka at midnight

and waking the wife who later  

asks him why he shot the burglar 

instead of asking him what he wanted. 

It might have been something she 

planned to give to Goodwill anyway.

He keeps the pistol under his pillow

to take into dreams that wake him

every night in Cinemascope 

where he again is the lead actor 

in films 50 years ago surrounded by 

lesser men in supporting roles

who drove him nuts when he was

young and handsome and now 

they’re back again because they heard 

he has Old-Timers Disease 

and they want to badger him 

about their wives who chased him 

all over Hollywood on Oscar Night.

They’re mopes, he tells his wife,

who never had a lead role, mopes

who would have been shot on set

if he hadn’t feared execution 

but now in his dreams every night 

these mopes had better duck. 

The worst sentence he can get is 

dreams for life without parole.

 

 

Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, Missouri.