Adulthood in 40 Words.

She doesn’t remember the tunes
She’d sing to me at night,
The ones that had the power
To crush waking nightmares
Into a powder for pleasant dreams.
This is the beginning.
One day, she won’t recall for whom she sang.

The Well-Met, The Ill-Met

(1) Roxy

Roxy is an old Jamaican fellow
Believes in a figure he calls the Almighty
His face is well worn, and he can bellow
A laugh that’s contagious and sprite-ly.

(2) Joan

She praises Jesus for every last thing,
You won’t get a ripple skipping rocks on her pond-
One day she came to work with a wedding ring
No one knew there’d been anyone of whom she’d been so fond.

(3) Kenneth

Kenneth has what’s called a sonic doorbell
He’s deaf, slow, old, and obese
Likes to watch people from the window in his stairwell
No one visits, except ambulance and police.

(4) Mary

Curious eyes too big for their sockets
The years have not dulled her wit
Decaf, cigarettes, change in her pockets
Husband and son, memories in an obit.

(5) ‘Retha

We used to call her two-tone
For her really strange hair dye;
Voice like a child playing saxophone
Racist commentary in ample supply.

(6) Aaron

Blond, petulant little fiend-
Put on a cape and flew for a while
Touched his mother, “I saved you!” and beamed
Being four seems a lot like being senile.

A Snake Among Sheep

A handsome, freshly groomed,
White with gold trim luxury car
Coasted beside my little box on wheels
And moored in the crumbling lot.

A door opened carelessly,
And the impact annoyed me;
I stubbed out my cigarette and crossly
Emerged from my car to address the event.

A tall and harmless looking passenger,
His dark brown skin, tired and dry,
Looked down at me with apology
In even dryer, bloodshot eyes.

No harm was done, I told him so,
As he shook my hand too vigorously,
I saw sickness in the corners of his mouth
And calamity in his clothes.

As he began to rant that I had met
The fairy god-mother of Jesus Christ,
That he had a map to heaven and
That I would surely meet him here,

The stately figure of the driver
In some tailored all-white suit,
Languidly strolled to come fetch the man
With not a movement of his neck or eyes.

His banded collar and simple ring
Seemed like an extension of his car
Which clearly was his pride and joy
And starkly lit his mad companion,

Around whose arm the preacher’s hand
Had wrapped with guiding force;
As a yoke on some delirious bull
Who has forgot his work and so, offended.

I saw them vanish in the shop
For well over half of an hour
And emerge with matching smiles
And what looked like half the store, in carts.

Shortly after, my wife came out,
And told a most peculiar story
Of a frail and unsound man who bought
Thousands of dollars of odds and ends,

Proclaiming he was on a mission from God
To spend his fortunes on his church
Through the envoy, his friend the pastor
Who’d bring succor to the faithful.

Filled with doubt I started out,
As the eerie image burned to mind
And my skin crawled off with concern
That something was unjustly done.

One week later, still remembered,
Came fresh news of circumstances,
That the sick man’s wife had gone
Weeping, poor, back into the store;

Had returned all that was purchased
With her departed mother’s leavings-
Some sum less than 8,000 dollars
Recently acquired in grief.

Dementia House

An all women house across the street-
Each elderly and riddled with dementia,
From which there issue forth, hourly,
Screams of fear and anger,
as those for rape and murder,
The blaring horns of Death the Horseman
Stepping over the coconut shell welcome mat-
Has brought to my attention the existence
Of much better things to fear
Than spiders, dead end jobs and loneliness.

The Art of Us

Make friends of infants

And the elderly, much more so

Than those between the cradle and grave:

For the new persons are those

Empty canvases upon which

Art will unravel, we cannot know how

But we can imagine it –

And that no style is forbidden

Upon their expectant plainness;

And the old persons are those

Canvases finished, dried and framed

Ready to be enjoyed and pondered at last,

Having reached fullness, completion

Only requiring a perfect lighting

To enjoy the exquisite detail.

Those of us in between

Are in the recesses of a studio

Do not look upon us yet, we are

Perpetually at a critical moment of

Becoming.