Donnie Poem by Roger Gerald Hicks

Donnie:
Back when Elvis was just a scandalous, guitar strummer, you were the toughest most fearless kid I'd ever met. About 130, & average height, you seldom bathed and were so aggressive that if you saw five whites beating one Mexican,you'd join the fray, run off the whites- then bloody the Mexican for causing you so much trouble.

We were hunting rabbits one day in tall, golden weeds, the wind wasn't disturbing buckshot trajectory & rabbits were plentiful, but I couldn't pop one to save my soul & was griping aloud.

You grinned so widely I could see the rotted brown edges around your teeth.Blue eyes burning you said, "Problem isyou're shooting an automatic." True, the gun held five shells and I felt powerful squeezing off several ear-ringing shots at boundingtargets."Load just one shell, "you said, that way, the shot must count.

Six shots downed five rabbits & I was Sergeant York of the meadow.Years later, I wore bronze home from Nam instead of an orange poncho.

Wish I'd met more kids who didn't bathe regularly.