Anticipation
It is for its reality that what is expected is expected.
–Heidegger, Being and Time
You fluster me. Branches, yet unbroken, must break
in next week’s storm. You’ll toss them in the compost
and you’ll mourn your father. Not yet, though. Still the sky’s
unfolded, his face on caller ID. Still, that future
intrudes on us. The trees might not grow in their twists.
You’ll mow the yard the day after, morning
despite it all. What will keep it one day off, if we know
it’ll come? Us, turning together in quilts. I came
and fell asleep in your hair. The wooden clock ticks
might rot if we allow. “There’s only a shadow of me,
in a matter of speaking, I’m dead,” crackled the LP
on its other side. And you misspeak when you say
the power’s out and cell tower’s down. The wonder
of it. Signal, temporal in a way. All the wonder
of dawn unbroken, but in gray. The heat of day before
it hits the window pane. Or the unbearable weight
of a clock’s hand on ledge between second and second
like a golden-gate man. I suppose the weather might
change again. A cold front’s coming through tonight
with wind and heavy rain. The front gate, rusted, chained
stainless steel, impervious as advertised. Street sweepers
already fastening the buttons of their overalls and buying
espresso shots, the night before. A unity. A causation
ruined by its own assumed end. Maybe ‘now’ and ‘then’
dance round one another under the pond bridge.
Something unintuitive in wrapping it back
onto itself, you pointed out as we walked. Although
we came back through the same door, again knocking
our boots on the fence post. What’s lost is lost again
when we forget to water the succulents. Conclusive ‘now’
while ‘then’ is lost among telephone numbers of classmates
and the general’s name who won Waterloo. Your grandfather
watched every ball game for two years. Or so you told him
as he lost his words. He must forget all that’s happened
or his days will be stained and petrified. His blue eyes
caramelized, his fingers hapless on piano keys. That’s right,
that’s the chord, you want to say. Something so literal, biblical
about cremation, said your father sometime later. Streetlights
flicker out. A power station’s on fire. We play rummy
when you can’t sleep at four-thirty. The microwave beeps
back on. Its clock set to nil, as if anew. We fall
together again as the storm wanes away. Your look
when you check text messages in morning. How meteorites
disintegrate to peace. Always unexpected, a convocation
in a maize field. If we had known, what we could’ve done.
Wichita, changing
Afterglow: wisps, a feather left behind
in place of foul. How my grandfather’s
non-being was explained to me. Clouds
lowered to hillcrests. Divested of sky
like half-deflated balloons dragged
from county fair to minivan. Gliding
overhead, soundless. And the laughs
of road workers, in the morning. Waking
me, from behind the curtain. The wash
was finished, drained. Mom’s hands
dried in rags. And in the wiping, prayers
proposed and forgotten. God had a job
but lost it in the lawn. Grass un-mowed
since the worker’s day, in spring. Most days
cars don’t park along the curb and bind
end to end as magnets. Between gaps
the creek could be seen. Caught in its
throat: plastic bags, leaves, and oil
swirling in the pastel. A drift of starlings
retreating. A fear of mechanical
clocks. Realization: electric kettles
and torn-up checks are no less real. My hands
to the cool of granite countertops. Seeking
a pulse, or any sign of continuance.
Separation
In consideration of future life, I refuse to stay inside today.
The rice cooker once came to life of its own accord. Its beeping
awoke me in midmorning, when cirrus clouds first wear their gray.
I walk between apartment blocks and onto the wooded path. Leaving
the street, I recalled my confusion earlier that morning. Sometimes
the creek, more sewer than brook, crests its banks in overnight hours
while our heads rest in pillows. The gush stains the path with grime
and twigs. Perhaps the cooker signals the instant the water pours
out of the creek bed. The ‘beyond’ confronts us with connections
so obtuse and frazzled, it’s difficult to reconcile. Levitating up
the way, a balloon of gadflies. I balance a pencil with caution
and divert my walk through the padded moss. I can’t help but stop
beside my bedside table each morning and tap my fingertips twice.
We don’t know how our habits defend us. My apartment’s A/C
cools me as I jump my name and dart about to break sweat.
Just as chickadees dance from branch to nest, I can’t help but sneeze
into my hankie. The provost of the local school sees me and lends
his encyclopedia. It doesn’t help. Besides, the pin on his lapel
reads: Aide-toi, le ciel t’aidera. I learn sign language on weekends
to silence doubt, and grieve for the deer that don’t read traffic signals.
I want to know everything, all the time. Upcoming, a planted bulb
uprooted at the path lip. I refuse to be sullen, to stay inside. Finally
they replaced the breakers in my flat. Leaves shake from their limbs
and puddle at my door. I want to wash my hands with lavender, gently.
Andy Stevens | one poem
Notes on a Living Room
Sitting around the low table
in the psych ward
of our living room
we each pick three emotions
from a placard.
She says tired, worried, dejected.
I say
hopeful, content, almost happy.
I wonder
if she is doing this for attention.
She wonders
if I am lying.
We take out small notebooks
and curl our non-slip socked feet under the couch cushions,
getting ready to write
our daily affirmations.
Neither of us write anything.
I say
we need to be happier people.
She tells me
we need to be more honest.
Both of us are right.
Both of us begin to write long sentences
mixed with short ones. Long beautiful sentences
about the grief between us and how we
ignore each other’s needs, how we don’t respond
to one another’s physical cues,
about how we need
to listen more closely to what the other is saying.
Short sentences
about hating having to do this.
After we are finished, we pick three more emotions.
She says faint of heart, fed-up, exhausted. I tell her
I don’t know if we can handle this baby.
Jack Freeman’s work has recently appeared in Hiram Poetry Review, Straight Forward Poetry, and Wraparound South. He’s the host of the biweekly Interabang Podcast, produced by Interabang Books in Dallas. He lives in Texas.
Andy Stevens earned his MFA from The University of Tampa and currently resides in southern New Jersey. His work has previously appeared in Prick of the Spindle.
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