my chest is as smoke, the atoms
are too far apart
from
each
other, and otherwise
like a half-knit-yarn-scarf
fingers dug in and pulled, and
pulled
until the knots all
hung loose
rattling, rattling
there was a nothing there
and i was nothing for
more than a moment.
her voice on the line
was the fog that seeped
around my mind
still seeps up from
the grating now
I am flat, crumbling
stone
loosely in the ground now
pelted by rain and cold
I am cold fever chill
I am the hollow, drifting
gutteral and weakened howl
of the wind, whipping
now languidly, now violently at
my father's tombstone.
His name is carved out
the open grating between my shoulders
he left this world, woken
in the dead of night
in the pain of death
fading to confusion
to the loss of voluntary
and involuntary function
he raised his arms
opened his mouth soundlessly
and wept wide-eyed
into the frozen-form.
the scene of my absence
is the broken record
the image that haunts
I can picture vividly
the sofa he laid on, the burgundy carpet
the bad-body smells
of death, and incontenance
the flashing lights
of a too-late ambulance
the echoes and shadows and smells
clung to and possessed the walls, the floor
for months after
the echo of his open mouth
and open eyes, animal
it is a home again now, I think
but
I am a shade of
his fear, his reduction, his
soundlessness.
I was told by my mother and sister what happened. I struggle to forgive myself my absence every week. No one knew it was really happening until it was already happening. They were with him, but it was like he didn't know they were there, like he was alone. I was studying for finals in the dorm of a friend. I got the call early the next morning after having pulled an all nighter. I remember everything about that night and that morning vividly. I remember that whole week after too vividly, and blurrily at the same time. I get potent snapshots, and it blends together in between.
