The man watched a Neil Simon
comedy from the 70’s and tear-
ed up over the music of that

day. Experiencing the existential
return to that era, he admitted
that he can’t get over things.

He drags the past along with
him like a sack of rocks on a
Western Flyer which he pulls

down the sidewalk of the first
neighborhood he can remember —
experiences, friends, family —

gone, some especially dear ones.
The man sat in a bar chatting
with a couple he didn’t know.

The guy was from northern Ill-
inois, a little town by the Wis-
consin border. The man knew

the town and a couple that lived
there. The man said he had a high
school and junior college friend

who owns a jewelry store in town.
The man had purchased the wedding
ring for his late wife at the store.

The store owner’s name is Dennis,
he said. Then he caught himself.
His friend’s name was Dennis. He’s

dead. The guy at the bar said the
store closed two years ago. That’s
what he means. Dennis is one of

the rocks in the bag on the Western
Flyer he pulls down the sidewalk
of the man’s old neighborhood

as he sits at the bar.

The Anthropocene
has become obscene.
Before Homo sapiens
the world was pretty clean.
We have fouled things so
Stephen Hawking suggested
we get on a spaceship and go.
While Stephen is now gone,
a spaceship we can still get on.
Shall we get in touch
with Elon Musk
and make a reservation
before the earth turns to dust
for an outer space destination?

He reads the poem of the day on
the internet and then reads the
poet’s explanation. Sometimes he
thinks the poet should put break
lines in the explanation and make
that the poem so he could get it.

When he started out in life
he was ever so small, some
would say a preemie, and
then he grew, eventually to

six feet, but as he journeyed
the pathway to society’s
success having, of course,
to push and shove along the

way, the buildings got taller,
the trees got taller, people
got taller and taller, the
blades of grass stood higher

than he stood in his well
manicured neighborhood
until at the end of his
life, which was shorter

than he would have imagined,
there wasn’t even enough of
him to cremate, just a tiny,
speck of dried flesh lost

among grains of sand on the
beach, which over the years
grew bigger and bigger near
where he had lived in a

house that just kept getting
bigger and bigger and bigger
overlooking an inland sea that
seemingly went on forever.

He watches the female turkey
in the driveway and then
slowly cross the snowy
road stopping to peck a
few times at something on
the ground and then she
moves on. Two days ago
she wandered near his
backyard pond. Yesterday,
she wandered around a
neighbor’s circular drive,
round and round she went.
She is all alone. Where is
her flock? What can he do?
He feels so sad, so helpless.

He thought to himself that
fat shaming is off the
dinner table so to speak

and thank heaven. It is
rude and crude, un-civil
not to mention that it

must hurt a person deeply,
but, having said that, he
wondered if something might

be done about the ton of
fat growing seemingly ex-
ponentially on the bodies

of Americans weighting them
down and driving up the cost
of health care. Now, apparently,

the excuse is genetics and,
of course, there is some truth
to it, but something can be

done medically about genetic
inheritance. Then he thought,
something has to be done to

save lives and save the economy.
The question in his mind is,
have we become so self-indulgent,

so irresponsible, so selfish,
so slothful, so much like the
gluttonous Romans before their

fall that we will just continue
to inhale the oversized fast food
meal deals to make us feel better

about ourselves? He thought, I’m
not fat shaming; I’m just wonder-
ing where we will store that

mountain of fat; the landfills
are filling fast. Maybe make
the landfills into ski slopes.

He then glanced down at his
bulging waist and uttered out
loud, “Oh, my. Skiing anyone?”

Someone said that he
hadn’t ever faced a
forceful, resilient,

politically powerful
woman before. Some-
one else proffered

that Napoleon has
meet his Waterloo.
A young woman reach-

ed into her pocket,
pulled out an orange
yo-yo and began flip-

ping it down and jerk-
ing it back. Down and
up, up and down. Then

with a snap she threw
the yo-yo down and
held her hand still

as the yo-yo spun at
the end of the string.
She let the yo-yo touch

the ground and she began
moving forward with the
yo-yo bouncing along the

floor, up and down, up
and down. “It’s called
Walkin’ the Dog.”

The arctic air
descended
while his heart
melted listening
to “Take my hand,
take my whole
life, too ‘cause
I can’t help falling
in love with you.”
On a hot August
day with a zephyr
breeze floating
over the palm
trees, he reached
out for her hand,
never to hold it
again. And as the
tears began, he
jabbed at the
buttons to change
the channel
on the car radio
and said to himself,
It’s frigid outside.

So when I die,
I will be saved
from any knowledge
of how people
react to my
death. I won’t
be looking back.
It is all for the best,
as even after death
I would, if throngs
wept, be tempted
to gloat
and be filled
with hubris,
or I would, if
there were only
those who like
Ebenezer Scrooge’s
business partners
gloated over his death
and glad for his
departure, be filled
with outrage at
how little I was
appreciated.
I give thanks
that, as promised,
I will hear
only the voice
of One calling
me by my
true name, the
name filled and
overflowing
with unconditional
love. And maybe
that’s a nice
lesson for before
I die.

Why didn’t we know
that obedience meant
listening intently? Why
was it a hammer crash-
ing down on the heads
of so many? Why didn’t
we listen to the screams
at Wounded Knee? Why
didn’t we listen intently
to the mournful echoes
of voices singing of op-
pression and hope — soul-
ful sounds echoing down
through generations in
the fields — voices told
to be obedient or suffer
the brutality of the whip?
Why didn’t we listen in-
tently to the beautiful
soprano and alto voices
in harmony singing for
equality? Why did we mis-
use the word obedient to
make others buckle to our
tone-deaf ears, brutal
hands and violent hearts?
Why were we not obedient
to the call for justice,
mercy and peace? Why?

* “The word obedience comes
from the Latin word ob-audire,
which means ‘to listen with
great attentiveness.'” — from
a meditation by Henry Nouwen.