Three-hours and $300 in legal fees into working on a resolution for my nonprofit to add “Inc” to its name in order to complete a filing with the State of Connecticut, I step to the window, standing there like a […]
Sort the mail. Wash the dishes. Turn off the lights.
Set your alarm to rise before the rooster.
Dying is but another errand to run.
Out of the blue our three-year-old
declares he doesn’t like the elephant.
For days he repeats—unbidden, as if recalling
a nightmare—that he doesn’t like the elephant.
Every year the same poem, the same
lament, the same sickness. What if
things don’t get better, merely more
tolerable? What if we lay down our
lives and nothing grows over us—
Some talk during movies.
Others crack their knuckles,
drink to excess, buy things
they don’t need, make
mountains out of molehills.
These are the moments, between work
and sleep, running from one task to
the next, I catch my breath, relax.
Born with a Stradivarius in hand,
Andy struggled to prove worthy of its wood
His head was often cocked to the side,
like a dog begging the Big Dipper for a treat
Who then would touch their torch to the sky,
bring down a raw, pure flame—
make light of so much devastation?
It’s all too much, the floor strewn with gifts
we couldn’t possibly deserve. But our son
is happy, going from toy to toy, and so
are we, smiling along with him as he plays
with the train, the trucks, the scooter.
You should know I find it easier
to write of climate change than love,
that time’s passage hurts in ways
drought cannot.