Poetry

Their Tracks in the Snow

In this marriage,

only she says,

“I love you.”

His feelings are unspoken

but roughly the same.

He takes it for granted

that she takes it for granted.

In fresh snow,

both sets of boot-prints

are easily visible

in front yard and back.

But imagine if only one was.

Would the other still be there?

Dead Dog, Dead Heart

A car struck a dog.

Happens all the time in the city.

But one passerby took it seriously to heart.

Another walked by

as if canine death equated with the swatting of a fly.

But the image of that hard-faced old man crying

stayed with me for the rest of the day,

clawed tenaciously at me for a long time after.

I was twenty-one

and ashamed of tears.

But he let his splash

on the sidewalk,

in full view of strangers.

Damn car.

Damn dog.

Damn old man.

I became this carnival game.

My conscience took potshots

at my character.

The prize was to choke up

when appropriate.

The creature was no less dead

for his red-faced breakdown,

my callous exterior.

But it occurred to me later

where its living had been.

A Blizzard of Memory...Then Sleep

A cry to do chores,

fearful imaginings of

what a stranger might do to me,

threats

and please...prayers

before the next one dies.

before TV,

no arguments, just rules,

and a thought for everyone –

filthy rich or just plain filthy,

dosed with better the devil you know

and Botticelli's girls and boys,

an Uncle who was the first convicted

felon and the family,

a loud whisper that

he was not really one of us,

wary of adult voices

but suckers for cartoons,

immune to insulation,

and a deference for feeding pigeons

that commuted between the park and high towers

so much happening in days unchanging,

we practitioners of the lowly art of childhood,

every tree and gutter gleaming,

every dog sniffing at my legs,

“Fra Lippo Lippi's imps”

the pastor said,

terrified of his touch

for all it could do to me

in his house of the Lord

dimmed as dark as a funeral home,

dead now,

same as the nasty ditty I wrote about him in secret,

so many showed up for the funeral,

they said the wings of his guardian angel

would shine gold,

overreach in bucket loads

even for someone with a collar around his throat –

it’s late,

I have to finish this

like it something I needed to do

so long ago –

I know I don't –

I prefer sleep

to memory most times anyhow,

but there’s so many dead

yet desirous of hearing their name called,

who won’t be hushed

as long as there’s someone alive

with the same blood in their veins,

I am the man,

the guardian of their ladder to heaven

or trapdoor down to hell...

in Rogers and Sons funeral parlor,

in callow years,

feeling but unable to quantify emotion,

and making me wish I hadn’t said

some of the things I did say

to those who deserved better from my tongue,

but I forgave myself a thousand times over

in those days,

growing straight as a pine

so did it really matter

when my lies showed up in the light?

anyway, back then

I was already learning to love words

and it didn’t occur to me that truth was a requirement,

so sorry, Mr. McKenzie, proprietor of the local candy store,

I stole those two black jellybeans.

and my English teacher, Mrs. Rose

who admonished me many a time

for talking in class

and accidentally drowned

while swimming in the ocean,

and my dog, that tiny guardian,

he of me, me of him,

who ran into the road on my watch,

and Mr. Glueface, Mrs. Slip-showing,

I should have been locked up,

instead I slipped down under bed sheets,

amid all the things I never understood,

paintings, vacuum cleaners,

World War II, sunsets

and, worst of all,

what was going on downstairs

and talk of who’s sleeping with who

and, on occasion,

which marriages were breaking up,

and who was on the verge of bankruptcy –

it’s even later now,

this poem is breaking up,

dozing off,

refusing to qualify anything,

confusing hardware stores with movie houses,

dreams with wings,

pastels with paint,

water with blood,

perspective with perspiration -

the poem droops,

the eye rests on the couch of the cheek,

when it comes to long ago,

I recommend tomorrow morning every time.