“Western wind, when will thou blow
The small rain down can rain?
Christ! If my love were in my arms,
And I in my bed again.”
– Anonymous
Beyond the lamp-lit room is a plangent rain
—rescuing trees from their near-drought dyings
and I ponder the thousands of nights
—of our separate sibilant lyings.
The western wind that now does blow
—that down this rain may rain
blows not for us – or too much so
—shuttling shuttered pain.
Through colorful rooms we pass and greet
—snug from the night’s down-pouring
twined in un-twinned dreams
—anchored in our unmoorings.
The thirsty grass and withered stalks
—exalt the liquid ambrosia
while in dry and sighing rooms
—we unmake our beds of roses.…
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There is a tremendous amount of ‘seeing -to’ that our male counterparts never
experience.
The terrifying and sacred moments of intimacy that daughters endure and
subsequently cherish; the anointment into womanhood with the blood of
our predecessors.
My cousin, James, was steadfast and sensitive, concerned and sweet, always.
“It is hard to see Nan like this”, he confided in me on the porch, turning his head from
the May sun and my eyes.
I nodded, “I know, bud.”
And I did know.
I knew the tenacity it required to even kiss my grandmother hello without weeping.
To his credit, I have seen James carry an infant’s coffin on his nineteen year old
shoulder, and that is a weight which I will never know.
He will never know the weight of caring for someone,
the ache of being the maker of meeting ends,
the reader of omens and omissions.…
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“It’s summer again, Papy,” we yelled in his ear. “Where to this time?”
Every June 21, his birthday, it was the same thing. Most of the time
we didn’t get through or when we did we couldn’t understand him and
we’d wheel him around the park, telling him what the flowers and the
sky looked like.
This time he said “B-bordel” and we laughed and poked him, very
gently, and yelled, “Where else do you want to go, Papy?” After a
while he said, “C-craix. B-boat.” He used to talk about it years ago
when he could still talk: young, stripped to the waist in the sunshine,
drifting past nice things. That was way back, before the war.
So we placed him in a rowboat at Craix.…
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The first time you get on a bike is an exhilarating and debilitating experience, and in this
regard so is your first real relationship—which does not include sitting next to your crush at
lunch in the 6th grade and sharing a bag of Vinegar Lays, which you abhor. It’s the
obnoxious giggly conversations about classes and professors you don’t care about and
movies that you saw that one time, vaguely, maybe only half of it—this is you placing
your feet on the pedals and kicking off for the first time. Once you kick off, you’re
conscious that this is the one and only time you can feel the thrill of your first bike ride—
and the terror that follows as you realize you can’t keep rehashing the same conversations.…
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