Category: Reutemann Road

COMPLIANCE

(Grandma Lillie)

White and wispy as spun sugar, her hair

Is still damp from the rollers.   Our arrival

Has taken her by surprise.  She sits on her porch

In the only aluminum chair left, her doll

Legs dangling.  Gravity has collapsed her

One inch with each calcium-starved disk.

She says she has no neck and cannot wear

The gemstone pendants we’ve given her.

She hadn’t thought it would come to this,

Her porch bare of philodendron, now

Twisting heart=shaped leaves at the neighbor’s.

Her sister says the nursing home is pleasant.

She doesn’t know what to expect.  She’ll take

An African violet with her and a rocking

Chair.  She’ll try to bloom where she is

Planted.  Her voice is thin as a harpsichord note.

A RECOLLECTION

My father taught me how to fish

Casting his lure to the pickerel weeds

Where slender shadows would be seen

That could make a savory breakfast dish

When fried well coated with cornmeal.

At other times we trolled for bass

While I rowed and he trailed his line

Baited to make a small mouth decide

It could not let that target pass,

A treat too tempting to decline.

I learned to hold the quarry close,

Slide my hand gently down the fins,

Wait for the tail to cease to swing,

Then softly work the barbed hook loose

So that it could be baited again.

At night the horn pout were our choice

With bulbous heads and smooth black coats

And sweet pink flesh we’d come to know.

Their tentacles we tried to avoid.

Our lantern brought them to our boat.

My father and I were often at odds.

I wasn’t the boy scout he might have preferred.

I did not always heed his words.

But I can cherish this memory now

Of me at the oars and him in the stern.

BABY-SITTING JENNY

We stroll the park, popping snowberries with our fingers

As I did when a child along the shady drive

Of my best friend’s house.  We’re pleased to find

Ripe Concord grapes hiding under leaves

That vine the walls she loves to walk on.  In the canvas

Swing her small bottom fits my hands

Like a teacup as I lift and send her soaring.

She is old enough to pump herself once

She gets going.  We rescue a daring toddler

Who crawled up the slide as a kitten climbs a tree,

Unable to back down.  Faster than she expects

Jenny rides the slick steel to a sandy

Landing.  She tries it again.  We follow pigeons

To the soda stand, and seagulls lead us to the beach

Speckled at low tide with perambulating periwinkles.

They single foot among the Irish moss and sea lettuce

Where clusters of mussels congregate like Portuguese families.

Seven geese drift by in a low-flying convoy

Nattering about the scarcity of minnows.  Jenny splashes

Ashore to dump her bucket on a sand patty.

The day is opalescent and fragile as fine crystal

Or the beauties she blows on her soap bubble ring.

OUR JON

Our first born son was tolerant of

His sister, born just fifteen months

His junior, but he teased his younger

Brother, who followed two years later.

And yet, he helped Dan land his first

Big bass, jaws locked on the lure

Of a toy fishing rod, and he took

The punishment for an annoying noise

That Dan, not he, had made.  Jon set

A high standard for high school grades

And he got handy with Tandy in time to manage

Data banks before computer classes were taught.

Jon’s first puppy love was Sprite, his beagle,

And later he loved three winsome collies

And Becky, their owner, as well as his tall

Dark-haired daughter, who shares his love

Of all things and customs Japanese:

He critiques animes, practices Shin Buddha

Meditation, savors sakes, sleeps well

On futons, kneels gracefully at tea tables

And wields his chopsticks with skillful ease.

OUR CHRISTMAS CAROL

We named you for the season but we did not

Know what elfin influence your name would bestow,

For as we came to learn in later years

You were the mischief maker in the family

Who dared your younger brother to walk buck

Naked in the snow to the wall and back,

Enticed your younger sister to taste a little

Temptingly sweet-smelling acrid vanilla

And your baby sister to try a bite of dog fare.

Treasure hunts in the mossy clearing were your

Work and forced marches down our gravel drive.

Big sister led her siblings a merry chase

For which she has long since been forgiven because 

She also led them to Bye Bye Miss American Pie.

ADAPTING

The towhees keep us company

For a little while along the edge

Of this high ridge road, hopping

Like robins, pecking like hens for bugs

Cocooned on crackling oak leaves

Loosened from snow by slanting midday

Winter sun.  We’ve never

Seen them up close before.  In summer

They scrabble in shadows, but now

The white painter’s cloth spread out

Over the forest floor

Herds them into the roadside leaves.

They are not ptarmigan, bleaching

Their browns to blend into blank

Surroundings.  Towhees make do

With leftover camouflage from autumn.

ROWING AT SUNSET

Feathered blades skip over the waves

As I lean back into the westerly wind

That encases and straightens my arrowing scull

Crossing the cove to the river’s bend.

A raftful of cormorants watch me pass,

Rubber necks circling like periscopes.

Awkwardly,  I too twist to survey

Over each shoulder the liquid highway

And pause, outrigger oars held flat,

To let a motorboat rocket by

That flushes up the black spectators

Frantically flapping in disarray.

They settle again as sinuous swimmers,

Casually dipping for fishy hors d’oeuvres,

And I resume my water skimming,

The sun as I turn a glory in my eyes.