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| My father, Frank Alfred Barbara circa 1958 with my sister Lynn on the beach in Longport, NJ |
POCKET CHANGE
Two pockets –
One stashes cash for bums and
beggars.
Not a large sum,
just a few crinkled
bills and jangly change
is all.
The other, carries two kinds of currency -
a wad of
uncounted dough in
disarray
to spend
like Monopoly money
and
carefully
counted crisp bills
money-clipped together in chronological order.
Famous faces facing left.
Fistfuls of ones,
a few fives,
tens,
twenties by the
dozens.
One thousand dollars
in all.
Always silver-clipped
with a
capital cursive “F” -
Not a dollar more.
Not a dollar less.
Not just on Sunday
to pad the passing
tithing basket.
Not just Monday to Friday
to pay the bills.
Not just Saturday night
to spend on the
boardwalk –
Not at all.
Late at night
my father,
caught by a spotlight of the moon
left on the dinning room table
like an
empty yellow plate,
would sit and sort
his money in solitaire rows.
Winner
takes all.
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| My nephew Justin, holding an oil portrait of Pop-Pop that my mother had given Daddy in the mid-60's. Justin and Pop-Pop have always looked alike. |
