This poem is part of my "autobiography as SAT test" project. Read the poem, then answer the question that follows. The correct answer and explanation are below.
The Jewish Biker
Like a motherfucker he rose
At dawn winter mornings
And snowplowed driveways.
Spring nights when rain poured
He disinfected flooded basements
With Lysol like a motherfucker.
All week like a motherfucker
He worked in the parts department
At the Western Avenue Harley dealer.
He used to say, ‘You won’t
‘See me riding Japanese iron.
‘You won’t see me riding bitch.’
When his old lady had a miscarriage
He fished it out of the toilet. Why?
Maybe the doctor wanted to see it.
Yet he was Jewish! His name was
Zebelman! His mother volunteered
In the Weiss Hospital gift shop!
>> The character in this poem is loosely based on:
a. Mickey Kalison
b. Tony Drago
c. Julius Jaffe
d. Leon Wells
e. Charley Livingston
The correct answer is 'a,' Mickey Kallison.
Tony Drago was the very sweet tempered son of Steve and Millie
Drago. His sister was Roseanne. For a time Tony Drago was employed
as a greeter in a funeral home.
Julius Jaffe was the attorney for the Harrison Wholesale Company.
His most memorable utterance was, 'But then you're dipping into principal.'
Leon Wells was an employee of the old Central Electric Company who argued
that the power of the Roman Empire came from the legionaries' consumption of
honey.
Charley Livingston, like my father, was an alumnus of the Jewish Orphans Home
in Cleveland. He lived by himself in the Rienzi Hotel on Diversey Avenue.
Regarding the poem's first stanza, Mickey Kallison invested in a snowplow for his
truck and picked up some extra cash clearing driveways in Skokie and Lincolnwood,
Illinois. Although I don't know that he also disinfected basements, there did come a
time when Bob Kallison (Mickey's father, and my uncle) wanted to disinfect his
own basment after a rain. When Bob was unable to buy disinfectant anywhere,
he declared, "There was no Lysol in Skokie!" with such fervor that the memory of it
has stayed with me forty years.
The incident in stanza four derives not from Mickey Kallison but from a
conversation with Tim Bissinger, 'the tough guy math teacher,' that took
place while we were waiting on a subway platform in 1971.
Finally, it was actually my stepmother Jay who volunteered at the Weiss Hospital
gift shop. Her maiden name was Zebelman ('onion person.')