Poetry: He Smelled By John Yamrus
he smelled
like
rotten
fruit,
but he was
interesting,
and
she
never
knew what
he
was gonna
do next
and
that was
more
than a
little bit cool.
her
dad
always
told her
to add up
the good
and the
bad about a person,
and
Tony
was good
with the kid
and he
never drank that much
or
ever
raised a
hand
and when
she did the math,
the
smell
was no big
deal.
John
Yamrus’s career
spans more than 50 years as a working writer. He has published 35 books (29
volumes of poetry, 2 novels, 3 volumes of non-fiction and a children’s book).
He has also had nearly 3,000 poems published in magazines and anthologies
around the world. A book of his selected poems was just released in Albania,
translated into that language by Fadil Bajraj, who is best known for his
translations of Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Bukowski, Ginsberg, Pound and others. A
number of Yamrus’s books and poems are taught in college and university
courses. His most recent book is Selected Poems: The Directors (Concrete
Mist Press)