Work and the Family Man

The hit man’s grin outshone
his orange umbrella and two-toned
saddle shoes, work was pure pleasure
these days, the hours even better, strolling
no, strutting down Fifth Avenue
on this breezy, drizzly Saturday
daydreaming of dizzy play
in lofty piles of crimson leaves
while family business deals
swept away wet doubt, circulated
iron throughout his hot bloodstream,
(he loved the notion of ancestral teams),
he was Hillary triumphal
atop infinite Everest,
Berra crouched low behind Yankee Stadium’s
home plate,
Captain Cook sailing oceans to stand tall
on sensual Tahitian white sand beaches,
and he knew in his dead uncle’s black pistol
and silver money belt swollen with bills
that life for all its vexations
and occasional rare honest cop
was damn good,
hell, real good, all the way
down to gristle and bone.

Turning suddenly onto Twenty-Fourth
and into a small quiet shop
just off the corner, his face somber,
eyes focused pinpoints of light,
silently attuned to the task at hand
like a world class neurosurgeon,
he shot the jeweler with a lethal
gambling habit once through the neck,
carefully cleared the carotid by a whisker,
whacked the bald man dead,
quickly wiped fingerprints with a clean
fresh handkerchief, combed his slick hair
and stepped out onto the bustling street,
smiled easy contented
a journeyman’s pride in work well done.

Late that afternoon when the Autumn sun
hunched low over Central Park’s open green,
and deeds of the day darkened behind,
he gratefully treated his twinkling-eyed
six year old daughter,
gleaming and gleeful as she held Dad’s hand,
to a thick caramel shake and heaped up plate of crunchy
crisp fries after a syrupy sweet double feature,
a maudlin mushy family matinee
of hold-your-breath,
last-minute-to-the-rescue
several horses and dogs.