Poetry Corner Sunday

Yard Work

Tod Marshall

No apples on the Braeburn tree. Some years, they
do that, you say. Your father, the expert gardener,
told you so. I'm gloomy. I see portents, doom,
disaster. Our neighbor mows his lawn every third day.
His name is Gideon, and he claims that someone
named a lamp after him. Click goes the switch.

Start the mower: upside-down helicopter
chopping grass instead of sky. Meanwhile,
the pinwheel across the street, among daisies,
daffodils, and a towering sunflower, spins
like a turbine just before takeoff, passengers
fastening belts, actually listening to advice, learning
how to float on something that's supposed to be a seat.

Dear Bean

The lilacs are stirring to life, their squeezed-shut pink buds beginning to loosen in the spring light. I think of you sitting like Ferdinand under those bushes, breathing in their sweetness. I still wish we'd buried you there.

The kids at school are working on their spring production of Seussical the Musical. I wake up every morning singing "Here on Who," and by the time I leave work, having listened to the entire soundtrack at least twice throughout the course of the afternoon, I can't remember if the book I'm reading is How to Build a Girl (by Caitlin Moran) or "How to Raise a Child" (sung by the mayor of Who and his wife).

We redid the bathroom. Raised the ceiling, retiled the shower and floor, put in an exhaust fan that I can never remember to turn on. It looks like someone else's bathroom. The door is loud when it closes.

There's a note on my desk that simply says, "Chia seeds!" I have no idea why.

I have more books than places to put them.

When I'm stressed on the weekends, I find a corner of the Children's section at the library and read until some mother comes by with her kid and looks at me like I've just set my hair on fire.

There are houses next door. Four of them. The ones that were going up noisily as you lay on my bed in your blanket, taking your last week's worth of shallow, ragged breaths. The houses are big and ugly and exactly the same. Little boxes made of ticky-tacky. I fantasize about them collapsing in a wind storm.

A couple months ago I was told by a ten-year-old at work that I "could use a face upgrade." He was building a Lego plastic surgery center and was desperate for patients.

I sliced pineapple and strawberries yesterday and you weren't there to stand below the cutting board and swat my ankles, waiting for your cut. I left you a few tiny pieces on a plate, which you didn't eat, because you're dead.

It's been warm lately, too warm for your blanket on top of my comforter, but I can't bear to take it off so I've folded it up and draped it across the foot of my bed. I need you with me, especially at night.

I made some eggs last night that looked like scrambled brain matter and them scarfed them down, barely looking, even though I wasn't hungry.

I've been going for runs after work, trying to get myself so tired that I can sleep through the night.

I feel like my body is made of lead. Every day.

I need something to write about.

I miss you.