Uncles
Uncle Walt drank German beer,
Uncle Wystan whiskey.
Uncle Dylan drank whatever
made his tongue feel frisky.
Uncle Pablo savored eels;
Uncle Osip, stones.
Uncle Seamus—cabbage and sloes
boiled with marrow bones.
Uncle Willie dreamed in a tower,
Uncle Rob in a shack.
Uncle Wally dreamed at the office
of peignoirs and birds that were black.
Uncle Bill loved many women,
Uncle Frank loved men.
Uncle Jack loved anyone
who’d stimulate his pen.
These and other uncles come
to visit once a year.
We munch a roasted bird with them;
they toast themselves and cheer.
In the living room we men doze off,
beguiled by the loud TV.
The aunts who cooked the meal for us,
who drank and ate and dreamed with us,
study us silently.
Joseph Hutchison, Colorado Poet Laureate 2014-2019, has published 20 collections of poems and edited or co-edited three poetry anthologies. He currently directs two master’s-level programs for University College at the University of Denver: Professional Creative Writing and Arts & Culture Management. Joe lives with his wife, Melody Madonna, in the mountains southwest of Denver, Colorado, the city where he was born. 
In the bitter end, Hepatica was a wash-out. His output declined from a flood of powerful if intellectually turbid verse to a trickle of squibs dealing mostly with the peccadilloes of Hollywood celebrities. Sometime in the '90s he pulled a B. Traven and vanished into the bowels of northern Mexico. Unconfirmed sightings abound (one rumor had him fronting a short-lived L.A. punk ban under the
These delicious notes on our prodigiously poetic forebearers are a feast for sore eyes indeed and can easily be digested in one sitting without any fear of gastric distress, which brings up a disturbing question: Whatever happened to that once-renowned, efficacious American poet called Sal Hepatica?
Uncle Wally's kind of aloof. He gives of a fragrance of cigar smoke and freshly peeled oranges, and when he drinks too much Frangelico, he breaks out his gypsy harmonium and croons a <i>canto hondo</i> that always brings me to tears. Then he laughs at me for being moved!
Joseph,<br /><br />invite me to your next family reunion, will you? I'd like a word with Uncle Wally. Been meaning to clear up a metaphysical muddle or two with the great man.