Lewis Robert "Hack" Wilson

Lewis Robert "Hack" Wilson

Lewis Robert Hack Wilson

The old time Cubs lid on his head

is sweat stained, saloon-frayed.

Course you don't, Hack chuckles,

It'd be stupid to brawl with me.

I could knock runners in.

Geez, I was 5'6" and 195 muscle-pounds.

Or I could knock a man down hard.

Set the Runs Batted In record in 1930.

Death-heavier than in playing days,

booze-lard over bundled gone-slack muscle,

Hack's eternity is a Prohibition Baltimore

sawdust-floor barroom.  He is wiping down

a game-used maple bat with a rye-soaked

bar towel, cleaning off dirt and pine tar.

Thing about drinkin'...

because I was born to drink,

it's a rockin'-ladder life.

You know you're gonna fall,

because booze is always about fallin'.

I died: the son named after me

refused to claim my corpse.