Poetic Obituaries: Jack McCarthy wrote about baseball.

He wrote about recovery. He wrote about how easily he found himself crying lately. He leaned against the pool table and held the mic loosely, speaking in a calm, unhurried tone while red-faced opponents 40 years younger pounded chests and rhyme patterns.

He was the opposite of a showboat or a blowhard. He spoke and wrote with profound carefulness and consideration, and an uncanny ability to get directly at the heart of things.

from The Phoenix: In Memoriam: On the death of Jack McCarthy, a working-class poet

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