Fixing Cadillacs

The eyes went along with the rest of the body, starts the poem from Midnight Depression. Wake up. At midnight. Somewhat alone, except for the phantom fish in a phantom jar...the one I've always been meaning to get, the night train...wait for it, wait for it...rumbling tracks...shaking the phantom phish...the occasional light nater interloper to dreams who takes the back stairway.

The young die. Too young. Too soon. But in plenty of time to avoid the body going south. I lived with a gay man for too many years. He was not out of the closet. I took care of him. Until I didn't want to anymore. I had better things to do. Take care of my kids, my grandchildren. On the day I left him, I drove east out of the Bay area noticing rolling hills so dry even thoughts could set them ablaze, wind turbines on the slope of great turbulence, me driving up and down. And then I noticed, this lump in my throat.

Lumps are great trumpeters of what is coming. This lump was benign. This lump, noticed when swallowing, would be eventually diagnosed: caused by gastric reflux, caused by stress, caused by the gay guy not coming out of the closet. My diagnosis, the last one.

Sometimes shortness of breath comes. My blood pressure never rises, except when they took the cataract out. We do that to people, the charge nurse said smiling.

Last winter, joint pain in the knee and then shoulder. It skips the elbow. Why?

Last winter, I passed my driver's exam eye test. This summer, never.

I went to Montana anyway. And drove some. And missed mountains, and nuances in my daughter's tone, a dog at the bottom of the great stairways, a motorcycle man, handsome, I think.

One eye is good now. One eye can see. One eye is doing all the work, while the other waits for surgery. My turn, it says. I'm tired.

My sister had her teeth pulled for new October dentures on the same day. How'd we get so old, we wonder. We once hung from trees, and all our secrets fell into a pile of leaves.

Yes, my good eye says. A start of a new poem.

on the side of the road

sometimes socks, or a shoe...one the side of the road.
You wonder where the foot went. If it's still attached to the body. You hear of people being stuffed into duffel bags after they're dead. A shoe might have fallen off. They found a four year old in Britain today, tucked under two dead people in a backseat. Who would have thought that's how her day would have turned out. Unless the dead grandmother had secrets. It goes either way. A random act of ultimate meanness. Or the road that shouldn't have been taken..

There were two purple chair on the side of the road I took today. Wicker. Worn, the way I like chairs sometime. A history in chairs, not mine, but I can sit on them and add some content.

And a purple table. For the patio. I've been wanting such things for the patio. Now they've materialized. It happens sometimes that way. The lottery that I've been wanting does not.