Miss Inspiration and Other Sailor Poems

By Thomas M. McDade

Memories of Naval duty aboard the USS Miller, DE/FF-1091 out of Norfolk, Virginia and service ashore at the Fleet Anti-Air Warfare Training Center, Dam Neck Virginia Beach, VA.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Thomas M. McDade
• Release date: Nov 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310697494

Thomas M. McDade

Thomas M. McDade is a seventy-seven-year-old former programmer/analyst residing in Fredericksburg, VA, previously, in CT & RI. He's married, has no kids, and no pets. McDade is a 1973 graduate of Fairfield University. He served two tours of duty in the U.S. Navy. [e-mail]

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Title Page and Licensing

Miss Inspiration

By Thomas M. McDade

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Thomas M. McDade

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Acknowledgements:

Special thanks to the following publications that have published many of these poems: 256 Degrees of Gray, A Summer's Reading, Asphodel Madness, Baker's Dozen, Big Hammer, The Binnacle, Black Clove Tradesman, Bong is Bard, Burningwood Review, Chance Magazine, Cokefish, Colere, Coracle, Crimson Leer, DESA Newsletter, Dignitaries of the Counter Clockwise Revolution, Doggerel, Fight These Bastards, Filling Station, High Plains Register, High Tide, Iconoclast, Jack Magazine, Jaw Magazine, Journal of Military Experience, Kitchen Poet, Liquid Paper Press, Lummox Review, Malcontent, Mangrove, Midwest Poetry Review, Next Exit, The Path, Pawtucket Times, Penny Dreadful Review, Perimeter, Peripheral Visions, Pitchfork Press, Poetry Motel, ppigpenn, The Silt Reader, Skyline Literary Magazine, Sunken Lines, Thistle, Transcendent Visions, Turnstile Review, The Velvet Box, Visions, Windless Orchard, Windmills.

Miss Inspiration

February, ’75,

I’m a sailor

in Venice.

Gypsies parked

in vans on the pier,

Doge's Palace closed.

Miss Universe rumored

to be about and some

lucky ship will get a visit.

An incessant net of rain

traps all but the pigeons.

Paying my respects

outside the Gritti,

Hemingway’s lodging

choice, I sense Inspiration

tailing me.

Rain dripping off her

wide-brimmed hat,

she snickers

while I translate the plaque

on John Ruskin's house.

The downpour seals

the lips of my dictionary.

Suddenly, I must have a Venetian

haircut and lickety-split a barber

is toweling my sopped head

so vigorously

my imagination rattles.

Later, I dine on artichoke

pizza in a restaurant

where German teens list

celebrities they’ve met.

Gusty rain jerks me

down the pier to the beat

of a Gypsy accordion

as I plot to ambush

smirking Inspiration

with a sharpened

pencil and legal pad,

twist her fickle arm until

she cherishes my words

as greedily as tourists

do a beauty

queen's autograph.

Wolfman Jack

Might have been

the seventy-five Med Cruise

or the one year after that

Wolfman Jack courtesy

of Armed Forces Radio

boomed through the Miller

FF-1091 and seemed as much

a part of the crew as Linda

Ronstadt who sang

plenty of Desperado

and Glen Campbell

whose Rhinestone Cowboy

aired much more than many

thought necessary

especially some black sailors

I served with in Supply

who longed for soul.

That was a long time ago

but when I hear those tunes

today on oldies radio

I do momentarily think

of cowpokes

before recalling

my fast frigate days

and shipmates

still in my life and ones

I’ll never see again.

And in some kind casket

locker of my mind, long dead

Wolfman Jack deejays on

and sometimes I obey

my direct order to amp

up the volume

to provide some

daydream peace

and quiet.

Lord Byron’s Lips

Lord Byron stands in

the Borghese Gardens

atop a block marked

with lines from "Childe

Harold's Pilgrimage."

Rome is hot,

the poet sweats,

imagines a grotto

in La Spezia and a plaque

listing his aquatic feats.

On San Lazzaro

where he fled Venice

to learn Armenian,

I visit his study,

view his pen, inkwell,

and scrawled autograph.

I try his meditation hill.

My guide who