Wilderness, untamed —
essential to survival.
His heartbeat quickens.

The day wore on warm
for winter in the north land.
Rain dropped off the roof.

We’re going for a ride in
my grandfather’s car, me
and my grandfather on my
Dutch mother’s side — a

small man, five-six, small,
bald head, fairly big cal-
loused hands of the laborer
that he was, fingers fidget-

ing on the big, black steer-
ing wheel, black mustache
moving up and down and all
around as he moves his lips

and tongue as if he is just
cleaning up after lunch,
which he is not but is a
family trait I later observe

in my uncles. We have left
my father’s business on
Cottage Grove and a hundred
and eighth and I, an eight-

year-old, am nervous because
I know my grandfather is a
fast, reckless driver and I
wonder about my parents’

judgment. I hang on for dear
life. Finally, he drops me
off at our home on a hundred
and sixth and Normal. “Thanks,

gramps,” I say as I jump
to safety. I stand on the
curb and watch him drive down
the street toward his home,

his bald head shining in
the sun through the rear
window. I go in the house
and look at the photo of

my dad’s father, my Swedish
grandfather, whom I never
knew. He was tall, six-four,
thin with a thick head of

blond hair and pearcing,
blue eyes. Later, I ask
my father what kind of a
driver my grandfather was

and he said, “He always
took the bus, son.” I wish
I could have ridden on
the bus with him maybe

to the Museum of Science
and Industry and heard
his stories about the
old country instead of

fearing for my life.

Jokingly, he called through the
window for his wife to stop gold-
bricking on the job of shoveling
the sidewalk. She put her finger

to her lips. She was listening to
two men argue a few houses away.
He went to the front porch and
listened. It was a father and son.

The father had retreated inside
and the son stood on the porch
yelling profanities at the man
who stood on the other side of

the glass. It’s January, the
time for all the fall out from
the posturing of pleasantness
at Christmas, the fakery and

finally, the drink or two too
many too many days in a row.
It’s Epiphany season, the time
the church celebrates the light

of Christ’s love for the world,
but it’s still a season of dark-
ness, in more ways than one,
and of longing, groping, and,

ironically, fighting, kicking and
screaming one’s way through to
the love and acceptance of an-
other — like the sad, soul-

ful shouting of father and son
a few houses away. As he turned
from the shouting and into his
house he thought he heard the

plaintive cry of a little boy,
“Please love me,” and as he
closed the door and intruded
no more, he knew that was the

universal cry in his own heart.

He thinks to himself
it has been a really,
really good five months.
This is something that
he has to take hold of
and embrace like the
love of his life who
stands outside break-
ing up ice on the side-
walk because he is on
physician’s orders
for another week. But
those are good orders
coming on the heels
of an excellent path-
ology report and,
pertaining to another
matter, the knowledge
that his very own stem
cells are rebuilding
the cartilage in his
knee so that when the
week expires and he
doesn’t, he can jog
on his favorite trails
again. He knows he
more easily indulges
the sadnesses, which
have come his way, as
they would anyone his
age, but now it is time
for celebration and the
chance to try out the
new running shoes his
wife got him for Christ-
mas, but he must be
patient for seven
more days of this new
season of Epiphany.
He feels like a little
kid.

A friend said he doesn’t read
poetry because it is so hard
to understand. My friend is a
well-educated guy with a well-
rounded education, a doctorate,
no less. I just read several
poems from the latest issue of
a poetry magazine and much to
my chagrin, I think I agree with
my well-educated friend and I
write poetry. My father once said,
“If you wish to be understood,
son, be understandable.” However,
my father was a quite prosaic,
plain-spoken kind of guy not
given to metaphors and similes
which I understand poets use to
help get critical points of truth
across in as much as people keep
saying that poets are the great
truth tellers. Of course, even
Jesus, who some would say was the
greatest truth teller ever, could
be a bit or a whole lot cryptic
depending on the situation, but
then again, Jesus was a pretty
plain-spoken kind of guy, kind
of like my father, so those who
have ears, let them hear or eyes,
let them see, or brains, let them
understand…or not. And right now
I’m wondering if this is very
understandable at all, like or
as or is….Maybe, I should have
finished that master’s degree in
communication theory.

He likes to think that he is surrounded
by the love of those who have gone before,

in whose presence he felt accepted and
loved, but where are they when you need

them most, he wonders. More often, those
faces, those very same faces, hover in

judgment on the sins of the past ever
haunting him with his failures. A thera-

pist once asked him why he was looking
at himself in those faces. Perhaps, he

thought, it is time to get out-of-the-way
like when you take a photo of a beautiful,

artistic photograph framed with a glass
cover and you’re trying to get your

reflection, camera in hand, out of the
way of the evocative, expressive piece.

He read that it hit fifty degrees
Fahrenheit smack dab in the
middle of one of the two poles;
does it really matter which?

Mostly white, male lobbyists
for big, ginormous energy
corporations headed by
mostly white men jingle

a little change in their pockets
and politicians have orgasms
just thinking about campaign
coffers and more offers.

In their best southern drawls,
the old, white guys stand
in one of the two houses;
does it really matter which?

And pontificate on how this
is their Father’s world and
how Jesus died for their
sins, for Christ sake!

And what does that have to
do with the cost of tea in
China, when it actually has
a lot to do with it, because

of all the pollution choking
the soil and air and water
here and there; does it really
matter which?

Here old, white guys clamor
and obfuscate while the South-
west burns and the heartland
dies of thirst while being

flooded out of house and home
and the South shutters from
tornadoes and those on the
East Coast watch water rise.

And the good, ol’ white boys
uncork a top shelf bourbon
not even thinking about gene-
tically modified corn in the cup.

And it just begs the question,
“When the old, white guys
go, will it be any better?”
Probably not, human

nature being what it is
but it’s long overdue
for somebody else to
give it a try, while the

white guys just sit on their
ass and hoist a glass to their
heavenly Father and Jesus,
who died for their sins

for Christ’s sake.

Chaplains linger; surgeons don’t.
Physicians say tommy-gun style,
“This, this, this, this, this. Now,
do you have any questions about
that?” backpedalling as they say
okay and are on their way.
Chaplains hover, unobtrusively,
in the background, waiting for
the surgeon to have his or her say
and then asking quietly, or maybe
not given the situation,
“Would you like to pray?”
He remembers a traumatic,
tragic time with medical staff
scurrying around, doing their
jobs in critical care; it is a
reality; time is of the essence there;
but nurses (he supposes out of
a sensitivity to the fear felt there)
lingered briefly while passing through,
but physicians, given his experience,
don’t wish to linger in the scare.
Twenty-two years later, his heart
warms as he thinks of that chaplain
who braved the scare with compassion.
Yesterday, it was just the same,
in a setting of much less psychic,
spiritual and physical pain,
but somewhat frightening just the same.
Technology had changed;
behavior had remained
pretty much the same.
Oh, yes, he gives thanks for
skills to make the necessary
bodily corrections
that would allow for jogging
and other workout sessions;
he is more than happy to
give all the medical staff
their due
with deepest appreciation
for the chaplain who lingered
a while, too.

She sits with fabric (cloth, leather),
stuffing, a few found items (buttons,
driftwood, rusty coils gleaned from

hikes and jogs in woods, deserts,
dunes and along urban streets),
wood dowels, needle, thread and this

really big mystery in her head,
which is about to be played out
in front of them, like a misty dream

materializing but more a vision
than dream, an artist’s vision. He
sits and watches all this stuff

accumulate, mostly the white stuff-
ing, like the snow out the window,
piling up on the small table be-

tween them. Soon there won’t be
room for the T.V. remote. At
first, years ago, he didn’t pay

much attention, but now after
being treated to Greek gods and
goddesses, African queens,

Native American shamans and
more recently divine dancers
and mermaids with arched backs

and faces facing the sky, reach-
ing, reaching and almost touch-
ing heaven, he pays more attention

to the genius sitting next to
him who on occasion will ask,
“Have you seen the remote lately?”