That Is So Twenty-Nine Seconds Ago

“That is so twenty-nine seconds ago,”

you glibly state through the flat screen

to show that we can’t make a go

of life in comparison to you.

However, having just learned that we

are so twenty-nine seconds late, we

take comfort in choosing not to care

about a 3, 4, 5, 6 g’s, infinity, high-octane,

technologically, powerful teensee-

weensee thing but can actually use crit-

ical thinking to work through a com-

plex problem with or without the aid

of a slide rule.

Buddy Died While We Were Away

Buddy died while we were away.

From inside the pool area we would watch them

Walk slowly, haltingly on the sidewalk on the

Other side of the fence.  She always led the way,

He had something clever, comical, endearing to say.

Buddy died while we were away.

She stopped us on the street one day

And said that he had died.  We knew he had

Had many physical ailments but we

Hadn’t expected that he would pass away.

Oh, we knew he was on thin ice, prostate,

Brittle bones from prednisone, four-way

Bypass.  I helped him one day struggle up

Three steps with the aid of a walker.

She, of course, led the way.

Buddy died while we were away.

Death, been there, done that, our own way.

We would take her out for lunch one day

She refused to sit in the front seat, a wife’s

place is next to her husband, she would say.

She gave me directions along the way

To the restaurant we chose. She was

Use to leading the way.

She had done it their whole life together;

It just naturally became her way.

A secular Sephardi Jew who speaks Spanish

With a New York accent, she took care of Buddy,

The baby boy with three older sisters and a Jewish

Mother. For Buddy, being taken care of was just okay.

It came naturally to let her lead the way.

Her Spanish comes in handy everyday

In the city that rises from ashes everyday.

She volunteers here and there to keep

Herself busy along the way

Now that Buddy has passed away.

We went to lunch again and she spoke

with pride of her two sons and their wonderful

Baptist and Catholic wives. That was just okay

Because they loved and led her

Boys along the way.

She insisted that we couldn’t go to lunch

again unless we allowed  her to pay.

We said okay.

Buddy died while we were away

And she kept going by leading the way.

He Has No Spaceship

Wind swirls, whips, blows, howls

Kicking up dreaded dust in the city that

Once was the destination for those suffering

The suffocation of consumptive lungs.

Large, particle pollution invades chambers

Lodging deep in the crevices next to thousands of

Capillaries more than happy to carry

Hazardous waste throughout the body.

Shortness of breath traps him in his body,

in the condo, in the city, in the sky, in the

atmosphere, in the stratosphere, on this

dry, dusty rock.

He has no spaceship.