THE DOUGHNUT MAN

 

The doughnut man seemed to turn up

overnight, no advertisement in the paper,

no fliers waving from the wipers of cars,

not even a shop sign in the window,

just the soft, milky glow of a kitchen light

signaling through the dark of early morning,

that heavenly smell wafting all the way

up and down 7th Street, drifting

outward with the smallest of breezes.

No one seemed to know his name,

where he came from or when, or even

whether he spoke English; he simply nodded

when we pointed out how many of each,

his thick fingers, surprisingly delicate,

placing each in a brown paper bag,

sending us kids on our way back home

where whatever small crime we may

have committed earlier in the day would

imediately be forgiven and expunged.

Even the body of Christ could not compete;

even the sun looked brighter and fuller

when shining through the greasy window

of that small bag, its warmth rising,

as if the day were something you could

keep close, hold on to, consume.

WHAT WE CARRIED WITH US

 

It couldn't have been much, whatever

could be tossed into two plastic garbage bags

and carried, from the station wagon

to the front porch of our foster home,

a word which we had neither heard nor spoken,

but one that would become as common

as a surname, shorthand for others to describe us.

We carried our toothbrushes and combs,

clothes and underwear, carried whatever toys

or stuffed animal could be retrieved,

while the cacophony of sirens sped our comatose

mother to the cold comfort of hospital rooms,

plastic roses, a potpourri of pills to replace

the ones which had not managed to kill her.

We took a blanket or two, worn and pilling,

superhero pajamas, damp familiarity

of our own sweat-smell.

But mostly, we took all that we could not

speak of -- the unshifting weight which

an absent father leaves, ladder rungs of anxiety

we could neither climb nor give name to,

the mutual shame of bed wetting

and the sudden difficulty of common speech.

We carried each other, brother, hardly

aware that we were doing so, always balancing,

always stronger than we looked or imagined.

We carried that grief until it settled in,

quiet and unobtrusive, a gentle tune humming

through the bones. I'm singing it now, though you

have been gone now these many years,

pausing just long enough for you to whistle

through the grass blades, bend that grosbeak's note

just so, rustle the cotton shirts and work pants

upon the line in a pantomime of breath,

the familiar motion of walking away.

THE FAWN

 

Walking to work through the half-dark soot of early morning, chemicals still clinging to the damp air, I am startled by the motionless gaze of a young deer, peering through the cemetery's black iron fence, solitary, unimpressed and unafraid by my presence. White mist, like the small splashes along her ribs, hovers around her. For the past two nights, whole blocks of this street have gone up in flames, set off by protestors or outside agitators, blackened brick and the empty easels of storefronts now waiting for whatever sunlight can break through. And on the opposite side of the street, this thin-legged beauty nibbles calmly at the grass and flowers, as if saying plainly, "This land was here long before you and your dead arrived." Having satisfied her belly and curiosity, she is gone seemingly in the flash of a single leap, an agility reserved for the eternally hunted. While I continue on, the interloper in this scene, my own awkward frame lumbering along, moving further and further out of view.

D.A.V. THRIFT STORE

 

Another nowhere job in my early twenties was

the D.A.V. Thrift Store on University Avenue,

unloading and pricing junk merchandise

as it rolled in off the box trucks.

Used toasters, baby strollers, bedding,

odds and ends, those old man cardigan sweaters

which I had suddenly grown fond of.

Harry, already in his 60s, black brille-cremed hair,

pencil mustache, blue-green Merchant Marine

tattoo fading into itself, chain smoked

throughout the workday, shaking his head

in wonder at the myriad things

people were willing to buy.

He had eyes for Gina, the young, blonde cashier,

doughy-faced, quiet, and disarmingly naïve.

Then, there was the middle-aged man who was

permanently banned from the store

for obsessively sniffing women's shoes,

kneeling before the rack in a form of obeisance

or defeat, a grossly tragic or comedic form of

loneliness, depending on your perspective.

We were all doing time in our own way,

students, retirees, and the occasional criminal,

going nowhere on a daily basis.

Except, as it turns out, Harry and Gina,

who ran away together without notice, sending

a postcard-sized photo back months later

of no determinable location: trees bent

into question marks, and long grass waving,

sparks of blue water in the background.

"Wish you were here," was all it read.

And I would venture that every one of us,

without exception, certainly did.

THE SOCIALIST OPERA HOUSE

 

It's long gone now, the place where the working class Finns met to raise their banners and sing the songs of labor, to act upon the stage a world that made a bit more sense, taught the lessons not yet learned. Gone now the farmers with broken English and missing fingers, the rebel girls and rabble rousers, the miners who shed their blood for a day's pay and a day of rest in this land of the free. Gone now, one dream swallowed by another when no one was looking. Though the bones of the building remain, housing yet another office, yet another bank. But the stage is still there, hollow, and long unused, holding close its secrets in dusty curtain folds and boards. The old songs are still there for any voice to lift again. The prop ship still hangs in the dust of darkened rafters, white sails torn and frayed, ready to set sail for a paradise, real or imagined, so very far from here.

MAGIC

 

My daughter pulls a coin from behind my left ear,

turning it toward the afternoon light,

smiling almost imperceptibly, obviously

pleased with this trick she has observed

somewhere, and has perfected quietly on her own.

Others soon follow: an endless river

of brightly colored cloth spilling out from

her sleeve, my fortune told by

complicated folds and triangles of paper,

the choices seemingly endless.

I pick a card from an ordinary pack,

and after a few hesitant attempts, its match

at last makes itself known.

But it's how she grew as tall as the pocket

of my work shirt, when I had left

the room for what seemed a moment,

It's that she chose to be here with us at all,

first appearing as light, then sound,

then an inexhaustible bundle of questions.

For now we stick with the simpler tricks

from her dimestore handbook,

the severed thread put back together,

the handkerchief floating like a friendly ghost

above the round house of her hand.

And I need not feign surprise or wonder

as she works her way through each.

I am, I confess, in awe of it all.

MISUNDERSTANDING THE LYRIC

 

In a few years' time, no one will remember

the popular songs you once butchered the lyrics to

in high school and beyond, so earnest in

your questioning and pronouncements,

so assured in your leather-jacketed wisdom,

singing them, with the others,

hopelessly off-key for good measure.

But then, maybe "negative two plus three"

was a clever way of denoting

the very aloneness of one,

and "guard your angels" sage advice;

maybe "take the back right turn"

were clear directions to a club where

none of you got old; and that brown-eyed girl

with sunburned legs, the one you kissed

and whispered soft lies to, never got cancer,

nor buried a son at seventeen.

So much begins and ends this way --

two strong voices speaking words in the wrong order,

or into the wrong ear, simple, melodic,

and ultimately nonsensical. So much hinges

on the misheard and unspoken.

Back then, you were certain there was

a difference between one desire and another;

back then, you were certain that

every song was somehow a love song.

And, in this, you were right.