Hank Williams on the Radio

The nicotine coating your truck windows so thick

it took us vinegar and old paint canvas

to cut through it.

The snap of your Zippo lighter

like the snap of a worn leather belt

when you let me fill it with fluid.

The ember of your Pall Mall

dancing in the night

when you told Uncle Joe that

jacks bounced

hippity-hop, hippity-hop

in the south Georgia sand

and you had to get them

on the hip or else

they’d be gone.

The rabbit’s foot you rubbed each time

the lotto numbers came out,

the one’s a dark-haired angel had whispered

in your ear, just above

the morphine patch.

The clickity-click, clickity-click

of the breathing machine

and the tube of oxygen that your fingers

fluttered to your face to hold in place

when your lungs were coated so thick

no vinegar could cut through it.

The ease of lifting you from toilet to bed,

your body but sinew and bone,

the husk that had once been my father.

Your wink after the eleventh-hour taking

of Jesus Christ as your personal savior,

cause it never hurt to hedge your bets.

Other things about you I have forgotten.

But those, those

I remember.

Gotta get ’em on the hip,

Or else they’ll be gone.