Wednesday, February 16, 2022

clench

clench

when i learned that my son was dead 
something clenched deep inside 
though my face made no change 
except maybe a twitch under my left eye 

i saw my wife collapse on the kitchen floor 
all the bones of her body gone 
but i could not move to help her 
not until the twitch under my eye let me 

in the days that followed my eye grew calm 
and unreality moved about me 
i swam inside it like the sea 
neither warm nor cool  nor shallow nor deep 

my wife formed bones again strangely stiff 
i could almost feel them pushing my hands away 
a hard ghost stood between us now 
his touch too much to bear 

a closed coffin built by another’s hands 
mocked the tools skills and material 
i knew well what my son knew 
the better craftsman than his father
 
when the builder builds he asks not why 
his imagination too narrow to see 
that the building will eventually fall 
and another builder build again
 
the creator creates us finite and weak 
our struggle so great we need no help 
in discovering new ways to die 
so rages my mind
 
my son one of many in the foreign place 
one of many fallen  into whose hands 
of the many families who grieve 
who can never unclench again

Sunday, April 21, 2019

easter sunday




on an easter morning in the 50s
my sister and i received 
a large easter basket each
the crowning glory
was a huge chocolate bunny
hollow and waiting to be eaten

but i could not eat mine
first was the dreary inevitable
of an easter sunday high mass
with the chanting and the incense
the pageantry and the raiments
the liturgy and the sermon

my heart and soul grew faint
at the thought of being wedged
between my mother and her friends
on the pew in their easter finery
with their latest hairsprayed hairstyles
and reeking of pungent perfume

i carried the chocolate bunny
and hid it in the backseat of the car
under tissues and it cowered
all through mass as my father 
sat and smoked and read the paper
as the warm spring day heated up

after mass we were greeted
with an unwholesome mess
of melted bunny and tissue
fearful of my parents’ anger
i managed to spread the mess
and covered my hands and shirt

it could not be hidden
once we returned home but
i cannot recall what punishment
was meted out to the devilish boy
i suppose my father tried to clean
the seat but the stain remained

often during road trips long and short
my sister and i avoided the spot
as if it were lava on the seat
we’d sit on our separate sides
me on the left and she on the right
pressed against the door panels

a year later my father sold the car
the stain a shadow of itself 
the place where still we would not sit
perhaps another child again avoided
the melted chocolate bunny stain
that spread beneath mercury’s gaze


jeg.

4/21/19

Sunday, April 14, 2019

the tomb of words

I dreamt that all poems were written
and that we’d write poems no more
a silence of words fell across the land
every language and every tongue

And when I tried to write the words
into a new and different form
to be original and and to be alive
the words would form no more

And all the words settled into an order
and all the thoughts followed in turn
and all the minds went rigid within
and all the voices sounded along

Neither good nor evil nor hot nor cold
the words fell as an invisible rain
upon the soundless empty souls
and new thought was frozen solid

I woke to find that all the words
had congealed upon my tongue
my mouth too full to spit them out
my throat too narrow to swallow

I woke to find that all the poems 
had been reduced to dust
what was important is not now
and the words interred into tombs

These tiny tombs did not hold
the dreaming words were unquiet
the ghosts of thoughts rose to haunt
my hopes of waking poems once more.

jeg.

10/16

inside

i am frail
and i fear the moments 
of weakness inside

tools

the tools are clumsy in my hands these days
i used to be so quick and sure
dropping the hammer dropping the nails
fumbling with my fingers
measuring and remeasuring 
and missing the cut

why do my hands seem to get in the way
they once were delicate and nimble
this is the second time i dropped that
stiff and unwieldy fingers
grip loosening and tightening
a hair more a hair less

my body has betrayed me in the aging days
eyes unclear reflexes unsure
memories dropped careless and wasteful
the fingers slow to open or close
numbing and cold
the jagged cut too short


jeg.

12/17

over

in this life
i have done everything wrong
i want to start over

death inside creeps

hovering at the closed door
until beckoned
death, silent, inside creeps
the cold breath
across the warm face 
lips part and slacken
the tongue lolls
the eyes turn
and motion settles
and time keeps on


jeg.

2/18