St. Patrick's Day Sonnet
by John Kendall Hawkins
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"Always after me Lucky Charms"
- toilet stall wall, Southie District Court, circa 1974
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Everybody in Beantown knows that old St. Pat
drove the snakes from Ireland. Boy, did they get ire right.
Ol Paddy was on a 40-day hunger strike
when the orange snakes slithered, shed and shat
right there in what was left of his potato farm,
and between fasting and famine -- Mother McCree!
He drove those little faux dragons into the sea.
And off they swam never again to do Eire harm.
But they might be wrong about the snakes. They're wrapped tight
in Boston South and C-Town and swear Garrity
was a self-loathing Catholic: Mr. CRT!
who had some kind of thing about being pure white.
At bar wakes, boys-to-men psssted Come here often?
Then laughed wild Irish and threw rocks at his coffin.
