The Caterpillar
tickles on my hands
my heart a broken cocoon
hanging from the porch
A man sits on the highway guardrails, his legs swinging
as he stares toward the skyline. I understand the hypnosis
of a view. Licking my fingers is a two-pound black
cat. He nestles while the brown tabby draws blood, still unfamiliar
with the sharpness of his claws and the softness
of human skin. This city is full of paint:
Greek columns and spitting fountains, a lizard with a crown,
a pie man feeding a T. Rex a slice.
The two kittens snooze in a crate beside me, paws intertwined.
Isn’t it always trying to rain?
My house sits at the beginning
of Dividing Ridge Lane
which is paved for the first half mile
then becomes a shaded foot path
running a deep distance to meet
Five Lick Road which goes
down the valley and crosses
a creek of the same name
Each year Dog Days arrive earlier
and now only dawn allows me
the coolness to walk into the woods.
Ah, the sweet morning when cool breezes
and clear skies let me breathe easy:
in a far hidden pasture a calf cries for her mother,
nearby wild turkeys give me a jolt
when they startle up from their ground nests.
There are a million other reports
that I could give, all ordinary
events to add to my endless iteration:
day lilies not yet fully open,
maples leafing out after a late bitter frost,
the blue hills lingering in the mist
of a sudden silence,
this day will not come again
The house is empty when I come home
I don’t get greeted by the door or followed to bed
My clothes are neatly stacked where I left them
there is no mess in the kitchen
it feels hollow yet heavy
Like if I called out to you
Your echo would answer back
Sometimes for a split second I forget
but reality is bitter and my memory is harsh
and I am hit by it all again
you are gone
You’re whole life spent
and I’m left to wish things were different
She removes the soles of her feet,
skewers them on wrought iron rods
from the abandoned carriage house gate,
roasts them over the firepit to glowing honeycombs.
Their wrinkled maps, turned veiny rivulets,
spill lava onto the greying coals;
tiny screaming memory passengers, arms skyward
log flume to their cremations.
A rain cloud pours its offering onto the grave.
Her exposed roots plug into the scorched circle,
she straightens her trunk and branches,
xylems conduct energy from Earth’s core.
No silt settles in her organs;
only moving water, ancient minerals, moss-filtered air.
Her fronds unfurl slowly,
cupping warm rain offerings toward the sun.
I didn’t know I was capable
of changing out a doorknob in sixty
seconds like a race car tire
until today. A locked in
spite doorknob, standing between
me and a raging lunatic.
he told me he’d be my dad
barreling down the gravel road
in a black S-10
country music static
wind rushing
through open window
dressed like Maverick
from the pirated VHS
of Top Gun
years later
we fought
over how I didn’t care
that his father was dying
in a bed an hour away
from lung cancer
because I didn’t want to
work my grandfather’s garden
without him
because I knew
he was never coming home
my uncle threatened to kill me
after he had swung his fists
I laid him low with a bat
a sophomore in high school
trying to think of being
a grown man
too early
much later
he was dying of cancer
alone in the house, he had
banished me from
shaved head
still dressed like Maverick
sores bleeding on his skin
it was Memorial Day
rain slick and gray
I showed up
stood over him with my hand
in his
as he cried and told me he tried
that he was sorry
for
all
those things
that had happened to me
I didn’t know what to say
so we talked about
the new Top Gun
I wished that I had a copy
we would have watched it
I could have told him
one last time that I loved him
and I didn’t blame him
for any of it
Ben lives across the hall.
He is hard of hearing.
How hard is a matter
up for debate.
There are variables,
such as:
the person speaking,
the subject of the conversation,
the time of day.
He has saved himself
from unpleasantness
more than once
by walking away,
seemingly oblivious to
the discussion taking place,
claiming later it was the fault
of his old man ears.
I think he is clever
in a twinkly and not at all
mean-spirited way.
I think I might be getting
a little hard of hearing myself.
You know, just like Ben.
Here are a curious amount of receipts:
