this too shall end.

                                                   This too shall end.

                                                                                                                                                   This too shall end—

 

from a place in the basement corner bedroom

                   beneath boarded-up windows in the back of the house

where she hid from the noise of an Alaskan summer solstice

                                    of driftwood bleaching, refused to watch the harbor pier

starfish curling cathode blanch cannon of sun fire shoot

                  teenage signal flares over spruce trees and secret drinking trails,

                                     smoking hills and beer-buying hitchhiker college drifters

                  who rummage through a swimsuit bin and slam

bathroom doors while undressing for a hot tub,

                                      daring each other to jump naked on the trampoline. 

 

Pass a fifth. Pass a joint. Pass a glance. Stack bottles

                  behind the edge of the tub to hide

                                                                         from kitchen window chaperone witnesses.

 

Or wind up like a little league ball player and pitch that bottle

of peach schnapps on a high arc into a decade-long hiding space

                    only found during clear-cutting for a new tax-paid

                    town sewer line that replaces the leach field.

 

And with nose buried in a novel about hay bales, she would lie there

at night in the fabricated dark and remind herself this too shall end.

 

                                    This too shall end—

 

and it did; the cheer of missed cricket darts and air hockey table clatter,

                 dropped pepperoni sheet pizza trays, empty gallon jugs of whole milk

shoved like a French-kissing tongue deep into an overfilled trash barrel

                 ready to belch smoke on the one Friday per month

you’re allowed to burn plastic trash.

 

This too shall end—the tripping mass of snoring teen bodies

                  spread on the floor of a carpeted garage after a phone call

from a concerned parent asking, “Is my son there? He left the house this morning

                   wearing a green hooded sweater,” and she answers, “Yeah, I seen him” buried

under a hand-knit blanket using a stuffed moose with a moldy bandage

                   wrapped around its furry leg as a pillow.

 

This too shall end—

these phone calls from the parts counter,

                                   the Facebook updates, the urgency of a like button.

 

This too shall end–everything she’s ever created,

everything my Father has created with her.

 

There is a point where we both get deathly quiet. Sit for a moment,

                                                     mobile phone speaker pressed hard against our ears

                                                     over long distance and we feel the world

                                                     and its never-ending process of forgetting.

Love you guys.

                                                                                                                                                                Love you too—

 

a benediction as we spin through the sky,

as an ambulance siren goes off in the background,

as we keep on living.

With a loud slam, the hooded form

of a high school boy wafted into the kitchen,

made a nest near the soapstone wood stove,

planted beer breath into a deep sigh

that woke my mother from her sick watch,

my sister having spray-vomited spaghetti bile

up and down the basement walls.

With a hand on his shoulder, she shook him

from a broken stupor, eyes shooting up

like a startled cat after midnight,

the moon reflecting in his irises,

a raw expression of surprise for both of them.

Shaken awake, my Father

investigated the scene of the almost crime

and decided the sentence to be a long nap

for this lost gentleman dressed in busted Adidas,

draped in a flannel shacket,

backward baseball cap hanging off his head

like a trucker’s lip cigarette. 

In a morning that called to end a night

where some had hardly slept, my mom

recalled the judge / jury /executioner, pleading

for him to see if the phantom did still exist.

At the top of the steps, as boots were pulled

sloppy onto holey socks of sweaty feet

my dad offered this hungover soul

a glass of orange juice. I think I’m just going to go.

True to his word, he did. 

It is shocking how thin we were,

as skinny as the fish in the trophy photos.

A bunch of bottom-feeders–

we scooped everything off the floor

into our smiles, no questions asked.

We fished, taught our kids to fish.

Built fires, taught our kids to build.

Rode hard–taught our kids to hang on.

We didn’t know any better and neither did they.

Surprisingly, it all seemed to matter;

the handguns and fish guts, hammered nails

and bucket brushes, rakes of steamers and razors,

melted butter and apple cake. It really was

the last frontier–each day a mix of oil and gas,

land and sea, baited hooks, cinnamon

schnapps passed as laughs in the woods.

I can’t get over how thin, those smiles,

that fish, the filet knives we used

to carve immortality into the spruce trees

and glacier stones that will remain

long after our names are gone.