For Steve Yocum
~~~

an old marine called me the other night
a poet from the left coast,
a correspondent and a first responder
to my messy essays

we both, vintners of men,
compared notes on our progeny's
full bodied temperament,
and our own full body's aches and miscreants

bemoaning our losses,
of earnest poets,
of friends, even foes,
and favored football teams,
and ne'er forgetting to tally up
our occasional victories

he authors books,
he authors life,
with grainy portraits,
that try to be peepholes
to clarity

me, a periodic poetist,
more confessional blogger shootist,
than artful-words-to-please dodger,
in a vainglorious futile insanely repeating attempts
to better separate
life's wheat from the chafe of its chaff

perhaps,
we shall someday meet,
a twosome of codgers,
walk the saddened-today, blood-reddened Oregon soil,
armed with each other's comforting wisdom,
tasting grapes,
acknowledging
but for the grace of god,
we go

together, to gather,
each other closer,
walk the vineyards and the cellars
to clarify
the wine from the sediment,
getting uproariously drunk
on friendship