Alan Berecka’s poems are devastatingly funny. I have always been a fan of humor in poetry, but so often comic poems are only funny, and thus easily forgotten. But these poems are funny and serious too. Berecka’s narratives chronicle an ethnic culture that is disappearing, a way of teaching Catholicism to children that rivals Angela’s Ashes (but isn’t so cruel,) and awareness of the fragility of life and relationships. And yet there is humor. I think of Berecka’s work as a space where the spiritual meets the physical with a bumpy crash, and parts fall off each.

Former Corpus Christi Poet Laureate, Alan Berecka has six books of poetry and a growing international reputation; he has performed and published poetry abroad. A retired librarian at Delmar College, he lives in Sinton, Texas with his family.

These poems are all kinds of comic, and provoke everything from a wry smile to a shout of laughter. The titles are marvelous. “McDemption,” “Why Theology and Economics Don’t Mix,”

“Wings not Feathers, Emily,” and many others which invite a smile.

In the “just plain funny” category there is “Divine Error.” Jesus as a small boy kills a friend, then resurrects him:

Mother Mary saw it all. “Jesus H. Christ! What have you done?”

Jesus didn’t have to be omniscient

to know he had stepped into it deep.

Every child understands what it means

when a parent screams a middle name.

By her command and his power,

the playmate was restored. Risen

the confused boy wept, then ran

home, where he waited for his chance

to holler and chant, Crucify him!

one Good Friday in Jerusalem. (42)

Many of the poems are serious, too. They show the speaker as son and father, as a devoted family man and as someone experiencing grief, as teacher and as learner. It is hard to give samples of these more serious poems because they are all narratives, and tend to require the details at the beginning which build up to the profound conclusion. And there is often some slight comic twist. “Leveling” begins with the son and his father “leveling my mother’s fresh grave.”

The grown son tries to act like his father, wanting “him to think that I/ had become a man.” But afterward, in their shared silent grief, the old man spoke

…what I have come

to believe was his

greatest compliment:

“Hey, kid, don’t forget

how to do this.” (20)

Part of the pleasure of this book is at the voice seems constant from the first collection through to the new poems. Of course the scene changes as the poet grows older and has different experiences. In the later poems, there is more of the Wiseman and less of the Wisecracker, but nevertheless, there is a consistent tone. I remember my first writing teacher asking the class aggressively, “Is there anybody home in this poem?” These poems are definitely inhabited, and we feel we know the writer and would like to have coffee with him. This book reminds us that life is beautiful and sad and funny.