Perhaps I Should Tell You

I didn't write a single
poem, before my
parents were gone.
Perhaps my good fortune,
their dying young,
leaving me free with my grief.

In my memory
of a dream-
a seal bobs in the shallows
close to shore, while a herd
of others scramble and bark
on a sand bar in the near distance.

Under pale gray skies,
piping plovers roost
in the dunes.
I place my words whole
on the unexpected page,

---

3725 Frazier Street, 1965

I was the first to smell the smoke.
My brothers and sisters squabbled,
seven 'round the table, giddy bedlam.
So many times we cowered, we cried.

My brothers and sisters squabbled.
Cans of Iron City, forbidden cigarettes.
So many times we cowered, we cried.
And I remember Mom's rage.

Cans of Iron City, forbidden cigarettes.
The oldest girl, I'm alone with the younger ones,
and I remember Mom's rage,
home with diapers, dishes, long division.

The oldest girl, I'm alone with the younger ones,
soot-stained windows, painted bricks,
home with diapers, dishes, long division.
My mother's house still stands.

Soot-stained windows, painted bricks,
the myth is when I left, I never returned.
My mother's house stands still.
O Pittsburgh, my font, my wellspring.

The myth is when I left, I never returned.
Seven 'round the table, giddy bedlam.
O Pittsburgh, my font, my wellspring.
I was the first to smell the smoke.

---

Funereal Recollections with a Line from Adrienne Rich

At the wake for her ninety-year-old mother, my childhood friend
confided that they called each other every day of her adult life.

I still hear my own almost forty years beyond
the grave, steel threads unbroken.

I can't hear myself think, she used to cry
against the unrelenting noise of our household.

I so want to tell her I've found a way,
"-a language to hear myself with."
But how would she recognize my voice
if she'd never really heard her own?

Is it true that at the hour of death, mothers mistake
daughters for their own mothers?

---

Since You Asked

A sunflower, dinner-plate wide, gold face to the sky;
another, head heavy, droops dark to the ground.

An older gentleman, white wine at lunch,
his maroon garden-print cane propped beside him.

Magnificent views from the library's top floor,
but not the sweet, musty smell I went to find.

If only I could tell you.
I couldn't sleep.

Passersby talking-"Judas was a saint, too, you know."
"I'm here, Mom. I'm still on the phone."

A child ringing bells on bicycles locked to the wrought-iron fence.
Shadows on the cobblestone.

Ferry horn sounds deep in the distance.
Pink blouse billowing, a woman paddles her board toward the pier.

Marie said you're not writing the poem,
the poem's writing you.

It's an art, this losing.
I couldn't begin to tell you.