Alzheimer
Like a walnut
Shell with its
Insides having become
Void
Of live giving
Kernnels,
……Holds
Nothing….
Empty..
Dingy…
Dark.
When I run out of things to say,
you’ll eat me.
To you, words are condiments,
like mustard.
You’re a silly army of hungry caterpillars
topping cross cake with cherry compote.
You’ll be food for the Eagle unless
you step away from the table.
This advice I offer
as your friend.
gives my mind space to breathe,
the meditation of shuffling,
the cards slick and sharp-edged
against my finger tips,
the acute focus on a simple thing
takes me back to childhood
sitting in a circle on the floor
knees touching, totally engrossed
in all that mattered–
the game in front of us.
(Yesterday’s Poem): June, 17, 2024
Four.
Four months today.
It’s been almost 3,000 hours
since I’ve seen you…
Found you.
How…?
Four.
I was 4 when you
were stuck with the cat my mom got me to
“help cope with the
divorce,”
Because…
We couldn’t have cats
in our shitty apartment. You weren’t happy.
In fact you were
angry.
But…
You would not, could not, tell me “No.”
Four.
The number of times
The “schedule” allowed me to see you each week,
IF it was your
weekend.
Swayed…
Fourth Grade.
I pulled away
Conflicted, confused; looking to place blame.
Too easy to use
your name.
Regret…
Fourteen.
When you understood,
I needed more help than “just” therapy.
You gave every
dime.
To ensure I
got “better.”
To ensure I
healed.
To ensure I
knew how deeply
you loved me; and I knew I was truly seen.
2004.
Year you retired.
My fourth year of high school, because you knew,
I was broken,
and needed
you….
Four.
The number of times
You bailed me out of “trouble,” we’ll call it.
Always hopeful,
in me.
Why…?
Four.
The number of times
I was humbled and moved “back” in with you.
1. Kicked out of my mom’s senior year
2. Dropping out (then returning to) college
3. Going through my divorce
4. When I fearfully realized, I couldn’t afford (financially or emotionally) being a single mother, of a toddler, living “on my own.”
And…
You opened your
Arms, heart, wallet, and doors. Steadiness.
Every
time…
Her “GrandBobby…”
Four.
The predicted
number of hours you laid on the floor…
Dead,
Until…
I arrived with McDonald’s breakfast,
Tossed to the side.
Replaced with begging and pleading,
To go back and hold you all night.
But
Instead…
Four long months in,
With every day wishes to just call you
again…
Penelope, I could never name
these feelings. How about morose?
I do fight sullenness at times.
Also a certain vagueness
that I fathered an unknown child
whose child with a baby in arms
(you) showed up at my front door.
My reaction was not jubilation
but astonishment that spilled
over into bewilderment.
Now after all these years
of seeing you grow
into a woman about to be marrried
and having the unexpected you
in my life has been like
having ones eyesight restored
after a long blindness.
There can be no title for this.
I walk in from the bushes, gooseberry sweetness
lightening my tongue, content with the life
I have here. Soon enough, I am back outside
watering beans I planted late (again) this year,
water’s spray—first cool thing today— wills
the seeds their magic. Then onto my son’s
newest block of corn, returning a favor
and thinking of his grandfather, born almost
a century ago. He, too, loved growing corn—
Brooklyn boy transplanted to Pennsylvania
Piedmont. We grow where we can, roots
and shoots always seeking something,
this soil, this air become my fortune.
Delicate grain
Made whole in in wonder
Soft solace of my childhood
Tan to golden loafs
Perfectly cut in portions
So easily smushed between fingers
White interior I related
If not in name than approach
I tried to compliment all those around
The base of a hot brown
Holding the heat and pressure
A background character
Now anointed in oil
With basil flecks and pepper
Cascade across your crisp shell
The warmth from the oven
Still seeps into my hand from your
Bun, i feel it radiate as my mouth
Prepares to break, to tear this common delicacy
again and again and again
Spent my last dollar on last night’s conversation.
Cost me far more than that buck to stand before you soul-baring
feeling naked despite many layers
asking you to see me
see me
spent
You stood arms crossed
cross
averting my gaze
backing away in form and function,
listening but not yet hearing,
bracing for the attacks you remember
the ways the loves before me turned meadows into battlefields
But I bring no sword, just a dollar’s worth of hope.
Staunched with patience, unafraid,
didn’t even cry despite my empty pockets
didn’t strangle my own reality to let yours live broken,
calmly explained how I love you and I’ll die on this hill
of trying to convince you to let me in, to let joy in,
that hating yourself doesn’t make you a better man.
Owning my imperfections
while staunching my wounds
because you don’t see them
see them
Spent my last dollar on this bet
that it’s not too late,
money where my mouth is
I still believe in us.
