take you on

my uncle told us
more than once how
his father, our grandfather,
of whalers’ stock,
blue eyes, a locomotive
of a man, an old locomotive
driver going wide at
the boiler, once called him,
his grown son, to task,
told him he’d take
him out and thrash him,
and not to think he couldn’t.
my uncle who’d been in
uniform could hold up his
end of whatever he put his
two hands on, just couldn’t
resist to try it on,
knowing full well
his dad was past his
brawling years
if he ever did,
they went down those
concrete painted steps to
the back yard on the
slope overlooking the
pond split with a
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