by Ace Boggess
I wouldn’t want to encounter him again,
although I’d like to know his story,
what happened to him after.
Can’t look him up. I never learned his name.
In jailhouse fashion, people called him Red,
which fit his hair & temperament.
Once, he tried to pick a fight with me
for saying, Good game,
when I knocked him out of a poker tourney
with bags of chips & candy bars at stake.
I was naïve during those first days,
not ready for a life behind bars.
Red was born for it, raging at whispers,
fists like flaming meteors
on their way to impact with the dirt.
Last time I saw him, guards hauled him off
in zip ties after he ranted, shouted, cussed, &
threw two breakfast trays against a wall
because one lacked a plastic cup of orange juice.
I have no doubt he took a beating
from the guards—somewhere out of sight—
until he shut his mouth or couldn’t move.
I confess, I traded him that second tray
but kept the juice.
Ace Boggess is author of eight books of poetry, most recently Tell Us How to Live (Fernwood Press, 2025) and My Pandemic / Gratitude List (Motus Audax Press, 2025). His writing has appeared in Indiana Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Hanging Loose, and other journals. An ex-con, he lives in Charleston, West Virginia, where he writes, watches Criterion films, and tries to stay out of trouble. His first short-story collection, Always One Mistake, is forthcoming from Running Wild Press.
