thomas mulligan, with the universe

There were a surfeit of items
Sufficient to raise eyebrows or cause comment
Among the few staid members of the Mulligan clan:
The appearance of siblings or cousins assumed (or at least hoped)
To have preceded Thomas to the choir invisible
Two or three women genuinely surprised
To discover the existence of one another,
One young man with an extremely disconcerting resemblance
To his “Uncle Tommy”,
But the entire affair carried on with something akin
To the requisite solemnity
Until such point that a couple bottles appeared
(The consensus being that the good Mulligan
Had somehow found a way to secret them in)
The end result being the proceedings
Subsequently devolved into an Irish cop wake-esque teleplay,
And in the midst of this fol-de-rol, Tippy Phelan,
Who had framed walls for generic bank buildings
And grunted and swore while cobbling together
Unnecessary cupolas and wholly superfluous cornices
On the McMansions of the small town well-enough-to-do
With Tommy (as well as, on Friday lunch-times
During the slow season, sharing a thermos
Containing a mixture which drew narrow-eyed stares
From lenient if still unhappy foremen)
Stood the final toast for the good Mulligan,
Intoning There’s a land of the quick and the land of the lost,
The trick being to build a sturdy span between them
So it’s only proper that Tommy was a damned fine carpenter

Reviews

[Delmar Cooper]

Inspiring, and it makes one repent of that moldy list of instructions left in the place in the house people leave tax records, deeds and detritus of life. That one with the word cremation figured on it, but there is something fitting about the final flush with some unloved one humming "Anchors A'weight", some fitting comfort.

[W.k.kortas]

A grateful tin whistle in your direction, good sir.

[jacob erin-cilberto]

wood int you know it...
did he build his own coffin?
I think those in death should be celebrated rather than mourned.
the service for my father was rather like that.
we laughed along with the tears fondly remembering the good times he had given us, then toasted to his memory.
Secret in the well-wishers and make them family, the more the merrier.
j.