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Category: Family

POEM: Good afternoon, Stan Getz.

Good afternoon, Stan Getz.

Good afternoon, Stan Getz.
I used to know what most of these
Portuguese words mean but now I don’t.
As I was typing the lines above I remembered
that you (not you, Stan, the other you)
also liked this album a lot.
In fact when I made us a nice dinner,
timed for the moment you got home from work,
it’s what I’d put on in the background.
My son is down the hall now,
listening to hip hop that’s fighting
with the soft drums of Milton Banana.
What a great name: Milton Banana.
I don’t know if his last name is said
like we’d say the fruit but I sure hope so.
Anyway back to my son:
Last night we had a long conversation
about the nature of happiness & security
& it turns out he has his own ideas
on those subjects & many others.
I love being surprised by what & how he thinks.
(Now Astrud is singing & I’m missing you.)
(Not you, Stan. Again, sorry.)
There’s a dog tucked up behind me on the sofa.
I chose “sofa” there because it sounds more
sophisticated than “couch” & this
is sophisticated music, you know?
Anyway, Stan, what was I saying?
I think the point is there’s a little snow on the leaves
on the ground on this little patch of planet &
that always means it’s time to dig into the vaults
for the good stuff from back in the day.
You’re one of the good things, buddy, so out you come.
Ha! Good one, Stan. Now you’re playing “Summertime.”

/ / /

27 November 2021
State College PA

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POEM: watching You Can’t Take It With You

watching You Can’t Take It With You

I remember all those times
in your parents’ kitchen watching TCM
I loved to sit there with them
trying to remember the actors’ names
or other films we’d seen them in
your mom was always the best at it
until tonight it’d been a long while
since I’d watched an old movie
another loss in a catalog of the missing

/ / /

6 November 2021
State College PA

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Mustache

I’m growing back my mustache. It makes me look like one or both of my fathers. Not a look I’m going for, but you can’t help DNA or random chance. There are other things I can help, though, like that time I saw my father’s hands at the end of my own arms and decided right then and there to turn in a different direction. If I had the chance would I do it over again? Probably, yeah. Take a better shot at being the guy my kids might someday write poems about. The time machine only goes forward and we all move at the same speed.

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POEM: dead dad

dead dad
for Arthur Lee Borders

YouTube told me my dad died
two years after the fact
a video, an email response &
I’m down a parent

the few people I’ve told
send their condolences
but I did my mourning
years ago

his first disappearance
has kept me sober
since I was old enough
to know about drinking

his second exit
is a period
to a sentence
already completed

/ / /

20 July 2021
Greensboro VT

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haiku: 18 July 2021

northbound tomorrow
it’s never easy to leave
summer sun setting

/ / /

18 July 2021
State College PA

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