Heard It From a Friend Who . . .

From time to time I manage to haul up a load of words that I glean from memories or conversations or events from long ago.  Some of these end up as bits and pieces of short stories or in essays or sermons.  And some become poems.

Here's one I discovered last week that still touches me . . . bits and pieces of a conversation over a dinner that have merged and fanned out into grief or reconciliation or just atmosphere.  Anyway, for National Poetry Month . . . here's one that has some tug to it.



Vacancy

Had you survived the overdose
You would be thirty-one today
And we would be sitting in a restaurant
Talking about my grandchild
And how your day had gone
With all its indulations
Of work and play
Or laughing over dessert
About your father and our sex
Or how lovely the day had been
While hugging in the parking lot
And making plans for the next
Time we'd meet for lunch
But this is your birthday
And I have eaten alone
Marking another year
With a big black X
And wondering how one expects
To make it through such days
When the sun is shining
And the world is awake
With promise and delight
But inside it is raining
And I am still expecting you
To blow out the candles on your cake