He’s hooked to tubes and monitors;
They speak to him hoping he will hear.
People test and probe reducing
Him to an experiment in a bizarre
Science fair where the best result is disability.

They cry for him, hope for him, pray for him
As the machines, hum, pump, and chime
To keep whatever he will be now alive.

I cannot see him there, but I remember
Days on football fields when we were young
Nights at dances with girls who teased us
In the clinches and sent us home alone.

He sold me my first car and we got old together
But not gracefully, not us.
We struggled against who we were
Trying to be who we thought we could become.
Failing and succeeding as we went;
Always friends who sometimes fought.


So much I remember as I lay here,
Safe until it’s my turn, and I wonder if he
Remembers who we were in that awful place where
They pray and hope to save what’s left
Of a good man’s life.

You feel it first with a sense left over
From when we lived in trees,
The force of it gathering miles away makes you aware.
Across the lake darkness falls in the afternoon
The waves grow short white manes
As they come now more quickly to the shore.
The temperature drops and a fresh breeze
Leads the way for black clouds that boil and gather
Coming now, coming harder, smothering the sun.
Beneath them is the dark veil of the rain marching.
You can smell it as it advances, a force men could
Never stop.  It comes, leaving a million scars on the water
In explosions adding volume to the noise of the waves.
The wind comes hard and I stand holding
The rail on a deck above the lake when
The first bolt sears the sky and roars.
I close my eyes and the rain washes over me
So cold there are no thoughts, just the
Feeling that for a moment I am clean.

I knew better, I’d been warned
By people I trusted.
But I ignored them thinking
They just didn’t understand.

How could they know this moment
Of mine when the apple seemed
So close and looked so ripe.

They couldn’t see her there
Half in the shadows watching me.
Who else but me felt my frustration
And the buzz of alcohol that enhanced it?

Oh, I knew who she was, where she’d been.
I know what she’d done and with who.
I even know she talked about it
So she could ruin the lives she’d never have.

But I was angry, a little drunk and had
Been rebuffed for a sin I didn’t commit
And couldn’t remember, which was a worse sin.
So I slammed a few doors and left.

Now here she was, my real sin
Waiting for a decision.

I drained my glass and stared at it
Convincing myself to step outside
Who I said I was and swore to be…

Then I turned and I saw her
Walking away, holding the hand
Of a man whose face I couldn't see.

She smiled looking back then shrugged
And I felt an impossibly heavy weight
I had not been aware of
Fall off my shoulders.

The core of me holds the truth I have
Hidden so well I don’t really
Think about it anymore.

I am more concerned with the story of who I am
That I tell to anyone who will listen.
I don’t think I’m a liar because
Everyone is hiding something
For some good reason
That no one else needs to know.

But the hidden truth leaks out
No matter how we twist the story around it.
It comes to us in dreams and,
When the voice beneath our reason shouts
Louder than our doubts and denials,
We hear it demanding to be free.

Some of us us comply
Releasing our truth carefully between
Crooked marks on pages others read.
Carefully I said, in tentative bits
Hoping for acceptance
We fear will never come.

And yet we write
Because we are helpless to hide
The truth that cannot be denied.
Thank God.