March 25, 2023

CONCEIVE OF THIS

No child, no youth
wants to imagine the moment
of his or her conception.
Now, that is the moment of personhood
in some places, a moment when
two cells become one and is
a life of its own, but it isn’t
the convergence of sperm and ovum
we avoid, but the act leading to it.
When you are an adoptee
and only later in life discover
your now dead birthparents
that moment, that scene
is a small void in your life
among larger voids you want to,
but cannot ever, seem to fill,
so it is left to your imagination
of time, place, circumstances
and ultimately action, but you ensure
that scene ends moments before conception.

March 24, 2023

RADIOACTIVE

I cannot say for certain which day
I became the familial isotope,
but I know my parents began
accreting neutrons not long
after their marriage, bound
to their mutual core, unbound
from me, adopted into the family,
and I then became the isotope
of the family but remote,
easily enough forgotten,
when I was not present.
That is, I suppose, one possible
fate for an isotope, it’s familial
half-life up and then forgotten.

But perhaps it was just
that I was the family’s
Schrödinger’s cat, finally put
in a box into which
no one chose to look.

March 23, 2023

AND COUNTING

How many times
had they almost met
over the years before that evening?

What if the Fates
had allowed meetings,
what would have changed?
Likely everything, nothing,
for when they might have met
neither was available,
he a student imagining himself
already in love, or both married
never thinking those relationships
would possibly end in divorce.

And how many times had they
been in the same place
separated by moments or hours,
so many missed connections.

And then the moment of convergence
two lives forever changed,
two worlds merged
in an unanticipated joy.

February 17, 2023

SAINTS AND SINNERS

I am a distant grandchild
of saints and Herod,
kings and lords, and
Visigoths for good measure.

That half of me is
woven of ever thinner
branches on a tree
that threatens to topple
from the lightness
of its other side, roots
deep in the rich soil
of Lithuania, the roots
hitting bedrock, and
the branches stunted
and there a simple
Ashkenazi Jew.

February 15, 2023

GO TO YOUR ROOM

When a petulant child
acts out badly, a parent
will send the child
to a corner, to his room,
for a “time out”
the duration of which
depends on the child’s
offense and demeanor.

What are we to do
when the child has
no parents, answers
to no one, even his adult
children, where can we,
the observers go, what
can we do except cringe
in horror knowing this
child had the keys
to unleash a nuclear
holocaust, other than pray
that his until now silent
playmates awaken and
put him in a playpen until,
if ever, he grows up.

February 12, 2023

GOOD RIDDANCE

I still marvel at the way
the mind can rewrite
the narrative arc of memories,
taking away sharp edges,
eroding or erasing some
too painful to relive, and
bringing others out
from deep storage, some
largely forgotten, to be
battled with in dreams,
demons wrestled to submission.

In my dreams I have had
a final conversation with
my step-sibling, who
told me of my father’s
death in a text message,
who never delivered my
nominal share of either
parents estate, who made
it clear I did not matter,
and in the dream I
pronounced him
dead to me and buried him
in a place my memory
can and will not visit.

February 10, 2023

FINAL TEST

If he were graded solely
on effort, he would have
received a B+ but life doesn’t
allow such a narrow view.

He had no father, no model
so he stumbled through looking
at others, unsure which were right
which were botching the job.

He bought an ancient first
baseman’s glove from Goodwill
the only left-handed glove they had
and I taught him to use it.

When we went camping
with the Boy Scouts, he the new
Scoutmaster, we made sure
to build the fire and set up his tent.

He’s been gone almost
four years and I remember all
of the things he tried and
for those I still mourn him.

February 9, 2023

AT THE CAFE

We sit across
from each other
separated by
the small table
that teeters,
her cappuccino
licking at the rim.
My toes dance
against hers
and she looks up
quizzically.
I smile and reach
for her hand
touching her fingers
feeling the fine silver
of the rings on each.
She pulls her hand
back and looks
into the rich
brown sheen.
I stare out the window
at the odd car
looking
for a space
in the overfull lot,
then pulling
back onto
the road.
As my mocha latte
slowly cools
I feel her ankle
slide along
my calf.
She stares
at the ceiling fan
just stretching
she says
and I smile.

First appeared in Flora Fiction, Vol. 3, Issue 4, Winter 2022
https://florafiction.com/literary-magazine/volume-4/

February 7, 2023

DO AS I SAY

Eat your vegetables,
Don’t ever run with scissors,
Clean your room,
Always wear clean underwear,
Comb your hair every morning,
Always say please and thank you,
Always listen to adults, they know more,
Be nice to animals and small children,
Clean your room,
Don’t go in the water for an hour after eating,
Polish your shoes,
Don’t play with sticks, you could put an eye out,
Clean your room,
Clear the dishes off the table,
Get plenty of sleep,
Clean your room.

And despite so very often not
listening mother, here I am
still getting by in this world,
although my room is still messy.