Silver Queen Corn

 

Sandalwood tracks into lavender.  Varnish

backs into cane.  And this: the way to my

father’s, his bath near the kitchen, his smells

of the body the same as his mother’s – it

wasn’t always bad.  His breath like my son’s,

his chin’s rough lanolin rubbing my cheek

on occasional unshaved days.  You should’ve

seen him bag groceries through strangle-

holds of cancer in Apalachicola.  He forged

frugal habits, forwent wild oats to help his

family sustain.  I know every living thing has

this love that drives the world.  In forty years

all Suffrageola will console him when his

mother dies.  A drink to the uncles: their sturdy

highs and survivalist cunning.  A drink to

the debt that hovers like Monadnock above

his fruited plain.  It’s true he’s not much of a

drinker.  A toast to the tongue cleaving

the palate.  The bell-clap at auction, the acre

unproductive.  A landing strip in the ball

field.  A parachutist’s slow descent in rain.

 

 

 

Thinking Map People

 

 

I thought playing the part of a city would help me

keep my feet warm.  I would be the tall buildings. 

Any kid would understand why.  Tall buildings

keep each other company – as small buildings do,

but tall ones make a city’s skyline; they make it

easy to identify, and the city soon takes its identity

from them.  The things they agree on become

the dominant reality.  Competing attitudes come

from the small buildings, but even if they out-

number the tall ones, their versions never add up

because they can’t ever agree with one another. 

I know what that’s like: arguing over issues such as

where to eat or whose version of the truth is true. 

I want to be the big buildings this time.  What city

could stand to be my brother?  Where will my

sisters be?  I’d like to be a city that can take a

punch, one that can stand to lose a building or two

without forgetting who its friends are.  I’d have

to credit the people who raised me to be that way. 

It’s like these feelings that keep me from freezing.