My poem, Riding the Rails, is in issue 20 of the Loch Raven Review. Here is the poem:

Riding the Rails

Uncle Frankie
was no longer young
when he started
riding the rails.

He was a boxer once—
his face peppered
by a thousand jabs,
nose broken

here and there,
and a cauliflower ear
he’d yank on
when he wanted to make a point.

Frankie quit boxing
to run with Abe “Kid Twist” Reles—
and Murder Inc.,
the scourge of Brownsville.

“Kid Twist” and Frankie
were two tough Jews,
my dad would say
with a humongous smile.

The Feds came
looking for Frankie
now and again.
“He’s riding the rails,”

we’d say in unbidden chorus.
Frankie would visit
every few months
and bring us stuff

to use for “show and tell.”
But we wanted stories.
Frankie was better
than radio—

with his foot chases
and near misses
with the railroad dicks.
We didn’t care

if he stretched
the truth.
We were old enough to know
so little is totally true.