For Robert Hartwell Fiske and Prince

Lately, new people in the world.

Kellan for almost a year now,

Frances since only this week.

We know their ways through life

have only begun. Know, too,

how immense their possibilities;

and the love we feel carries with it

the immensity of what might be.

Lately, people are leaving the world.

Prince on the day Frances arrived,

Hundreds, thousands, more on that day, too.

And now, you, Robert.

We are struck by the immensity of your possibilities—

the ones you realized, the ones that will have to wait

for another lifetime, another universe.

We remember you — every one of you—

and know your contributions had only begun.

Know, too, what we couldn’t have known.

Miss, too, what we shouldn’t have missed.

The winners: the greedy, the warmongers,

the druggers, the politicians.

This immensity of stupidity — its stench

that burns the black bog to its core.

We drown in its slow pulse. And then,

the newborn’s cry, the smiles, the wonder,

the openness of laughter, the trust still trusting.

Robert now gone; Frances begins.

Prince now gone; Kellan pushes his toy cart

across the immensity of living room and yard.

Makenna applauds her new-found Frances.

Logan builds castles of blocks and sand.

Dylan runs the full length of the soccer field

without the burdens of win and lose.

Lately, your loss. Lately, your return —
as though we could guess which new one you are.

Baby Steps

I’m walking through the wooded outskirts of Belmont Lake with my father. He is friendly on this day, and the woods are dressed in green for early spring. He has taken his first baby steps into dementia.

The whoosh of cars along the parkway, about a half-mile from us, bothers me. He notices.

“Traffic. The sound of real life,” I explain.

He sweeps his long arm in the direction of the trees and shrubs lining the narrow path around the lake:

“That isn’t real life. These trees, the walk. This is real life.”

Clarity. Then more baby steps, until he’s gone.

For Juno (I haven't forgotten you)

You are too soon an old dog and sleep out your days deeply, your nose pressed against the sliding glass door, looking at nothing with open eyes. And yet you dream. I know you dream because your front legs race through the air as though two legs were quite enough, after all.

Everyone tells me your time is up, that I should take you to the vet and do right by you—put you down, as they say, cut short your life of sleep and dream. But here you are running like a filly in your sleep, your huge white paws galloping. Where? Perhaps across a field of grass and purple heather. Perhaps through winding streets into pine woods where squirrels gather nuts, where cats meow, where rabbits twitch their pink noses and scurry into the underbrush.

Tomorrow morning, I’ll lean into your sleeping face and whisper, “Breakfast.”

You’ll lift your wobbly head, one eye closed, fur matted on half your face, your tail half-sweeping the floor, your memory half-aware that something good always follows the word breakfast. When I put your food in front of you, it will take you a good half minute to understand that it’s yours, that in order to enjoy more than the scent of it, you’ll have to open your mouth around it and chew. You’ll take your time, savoring each morsel as though it were your first or last.

You’ll spend an hour or so sitting outside with Saki and Magregor, maybe watching cars speed by, maybe studying the low-cut grass under your nose. You might even manage a half-bark at a passerby; but a tiny breeze will comb your fur or a red bird will land on the fence, and the reason for your half-bark will be forgotten. 

The day after that, it will be the same, and the day after that, too. You’ll sleep; you’ll run in dreams, and there will be music in your waking hours, cars to watch, friends and grass to sniff, breakfast to contemplate, and then more dreams of bouncing through the yard as you did in younger days when life had years and years to go before the final curve.

And then one day, there will be no more breakfasts or dreams. I know it’s coming soon. I know by the way Saki and Magregor sit close to you, the way they sniff you and then look to me for an answer. We are prepared. We are grateful for the many good mornings of this long goodbye. When you’re gone, people will say you were a magnificent dog and that you had a good life. There will be comfort in hearing this.

Snapshot

Looking at this old snapshot of us,

anyone would think we were

together in that sense of

together we were not;

and no one would believe it if I said —
we were not.

Looking at this old snapshot of us,

anyone would notice

how my arms loop easily,

even possessively, around your neck,

and how I’m leaning into your side as though

your side were mine to lean into.

You’re facing the camera, smiling;

your right arm reaching comfortably

around the arch of my back,

your hand resting on my hip as though

you were used to resting it there, as though

my hip were yours to rest on.

Looking at this old snapshot of us,

anyone would notice—perhaps even feel—

the firmness of your arm as you pull me

closer, tighter into you, as though

we were together in that sense of

together we were not;

and no one would believe it if I said —
we were not.