A FEW MORE HOURS

Mothers seem to know, even new ones can tell

when a cry is different, the forehead a bit warmer,

complexion not quite the same, a changed appetite.

She knew when to stay home, when to insist, when

to give in. Her voice and descriptions of the baby

made the doctor tell her, “Take him to the hospital”.

A few more hours would’ve been too late, he said.

Tonight, I’m walking home, just three blocks

to the little rented house on Compton Avenue.

I’ll sleep alone, it’s my wife’s turn to spend the

night in a chair next to our son’s hospital bed.

It’s a colder than usual January with temperatures

in the teens, I shiver under my too thin winter coat,

I clench my fists in my gloves, wrap my scarf tighter.

I wonder if tears can freeze as I think of losing him.

MOTH ON A PORCHLIGHT

He was the guy at work who could fix anything,

but he couldn’t fix himself. We found him crying

and belligerent in The Towne Tavern only days

after his brother passed from a heroin overdose.

Your weakness is what’s going to kill you, he said

as we drove him to the brick row house apartments.

He insisted I come in to see his new guitar, to hear

a song he’d learned. Hendrix and Santana posters

covered the walls and with each riff, tears rolled down

his cheek, a neighbor’s dog barked, his mother yelled.

After that summer, he almost got clean and sober.

Now twenty five years later, I came across his picture

in the paper, he’s on the run, evasion of child support.

Secretly, I pray he gets far away, I wonder if he's got his

guitar with him and hope one day he finds a way to kick it.

FRAGMENTS OF THE BROKEN PEOPLE

traded a saddle for a front porch rocking chair,

crippled hands no longer grip oil paint brushes,

old fullback stops every few yards to sit and rest,

waiting for an oxygen tank delivery each week,

fold up walker needed to get into the restaurants,

watching birds from a hospital bed near the window,

lost sight, can’t read the Bible or write his sermons,

White Label for breakfast and a liver full of holes,

silenced by stroke, no more anger or hateful words,

fallen on pavement, can’t lead students into school,

Intensive Care, too young for spinal taps, IVs, antibiotics,

lost a limb and the will to continue with a new fight,

advanced degrees, all those books, can’t remember us.

FIND YOUR WAY BACK

They head out onto the highway at 3am,

an early start on the miles, to beat the traffic

of Baltimore, the heat of the hot summer sun.

He thinks of days before MapQuest or Internet.

How he’d sit up the night before with a huge

Rand McNally Road Atlas and a yellow legal pad

finding the turns, short cuts, and scenic route.

“A bundle of nerves, jumpy as a cat”, 700 miles

alone for the first time, so his father explained it

in his signature, matter of fact, practical way.

Not many people know it, but truck drivers do-

Take odd roads north and south, like 81, 77, and 95.

Take even roads east and west, like 70, 76, and 40.

Read the Interstate signs, you’ll find your way back.

SORT OF KNEW

Sometimes I didn’t hear from him for a year.

There’d always be a Christmas card, sometimes

it’d arrive a week late, overseas postmark,

scrawled handwriting, difficult to read a return

address, there was no mistaking who’d sent it.

Nothing came up in my search of obituaries

from his rural county in Northern Ireland.

Last time we spoke on the phone, I found him

in his usual excited manner, explaining his illness,

how it’d spread. He snuck in the word, “terminal”.

Brushing off my grief, he told me not to make

too much of it, It’d been a good life, to be sure.

Lad, I’ve figured it out, it’s only really about the

moments spent with loved ones and friends.

Your call today is proof of how great it’s been.

In the end, I found out from a mutual friend-

Your suspicions regarding Myles’ health are confirmed;

Myles has passed on, bless his soul. His Aunt was kind enough

to send a note highlighting what we already knew about the man.

Cheerful, positive and more concerned about everyone else.

DAY OF THE DEAD

“What have I become, my sweetest friend?

Everyone I know goes away in the end.”

- Hurt, Johnny Cash (written by Trent Reznor)

Lately, every day feels like it’s the Day of the Dead.

I always wonder what it’d be like to drink one more

cup of black coffee with him from a chipped mug on the

porch as the sun goes down. I find myself thinking about

nights before supper, listening to her stories as she makes

biscuits or I imagine riding with him in his white pickup truck

around the fence line of his cattle fields, looking for calves.

Some days it feels like I’m watching a movie called, My Life

and each time it’s shot with different camera angles or lighting.

My favorite scene is when I’m seated with her on the boardwalk,

eating a sugar cone. Then there’s the one where I’m covered with

an itchy stadium blanket and he’s making a fire as we get ready

to watch the Saturday night hockey games in the “back room”.

Another great episode is set on the highways of New Jersey

and New York, we’re laughing about the 100 degree heat,

the hard work, our basketball games and getting easily lost.

Some days the regrets start up, I think you know what I mean?

It’s usually the unanswered invitations, the wasted moments

or the simply because the list is getting longer and the dead

are accumulating as I get older and I don’t like feeling this way.

Lately I’ve been thinking of others too, and this worries me.

Some days I stop to recall the old lady on the beach who

used to give us all candy, or a girl from elementary school

who was found dead, floating naked in our town’s river.

My Sunday School teacher’s granddaughter, she had a hole

in her heart or a high school classmate who feel asleep at

the wheel and never made it home from the third shift.

I wonder if others are haunted by the memories too.

I wonder if they’d confess too or if there are days when

nothing triggers thoughts of the ones who have left us.

Will there be a day when I won’t think of them or will I

keep shaking it off with a sigh, a laugh,or will I always cry?

TOMORROW'S PHONE CALL

Usually it’s the flowers that remind him-

grape hyacinths, lily of the valley, forsythia.

He meant to, but too much time had passed.

How awkward it’d be for them to speak now.

At a funeral, she didn’t recognize him, seated

in a corner away from the crying and hugging.

A slide show with self selected soundtrack

playing “it’s so hard to say goodbye to yesterday”.

His wife found it odd when he came home and

told her how his mother hadn’t recognized him.

Must’ve been the white hair, my beard, or all the

years without a single word spoken between us.

They say, even animals know their young

when they see them after years of being apart.

He didn’t blame her and planned to call,

once he found the time to talk about it.

Tomorrow I’ll call her, before the next

funeral, which could be hers, or his, or mine.