He said he had been reading some
good articles in the latest AARP
magazine on healthy eating as he
reached for a bag in the cupboard
and emptied a large portion into a
bowl. She said, “That’s not exactly
a healthy snack.” He said, “It has
cheese in it and a vegetable.”
“That’s Korn with a K,” she said
looking at the front of the bag.
The Chocolate Lab followed behind
him as he headed to his chair.
Apparently, the dog didn’t care
how the word was spelled.

the poet quoted william james on marriage:
“overlooking, overlooking.” the theologian

wrote docta ignorantia: “learned ignorance.”
the man said, while looking across the table,

“i have to get serious about those things.”
the woman smiled the smile of docta ignorantia

while “overlooking, overlooking” what she was
looking at across the table.

The good rabbi stated, “If it
were going really, really well
for you, look out.” Actually,
I think that is a variation on
Murphy’s Law, which says
something like “If anything
can go wrong, it will,” but this
probably just went wrong in
the two quotes because I have
no idea if either is accurate,
even if the sentiment is at
least somewhat accurate,
which I think it is and with
that I’m going to stop now.

The news was ubiquitous —
rioting, looting, burning,
once more, once more, once more,
the Power sat home, perhaps
watched, perhaps not,
days would pass, news would
move on, promises, promises,
once more, once more, once more,
the Power switched to
Market Watch.

The man remembers overhearing a guy
at the condo pool discuss the previous
evening’s happy hour at a pretty swank
steak house. The man only saw the guy
drink diet pop. The guy was saying that
he orders lots of appetizers because he
feels bad only ordering diet pop instead
of booze. Then the man heard the guy
say that he doesn’t drink anymore be-
cause it wasn’t a pretty sight when he
did. The man also remembers asking an
acquaintance at Tuesday $5 hamburger
and chips night at an American Legion
Post in a little town near where the man
and his wife like to camp, why the fellow
wasn’t having a drink. He said he quit a
couple of years after returning from Viet
Nam. Then the vet quickly added that
when he drank, it wasn’t a pretty sight.
The man thought about those two things
and some others that made him wince as
he sipped his dirty martini at a Platinum
LED hotel during another happy hour.

He thought about his life by the decade:
Went where told.
Slapped upside the head.
Started out.
Wondered.
Slapped upside the head, again.
Hit stride.
Slowed down.

Watching a program on child abuse,
the man shuddered and relived the
moment he picked up his baby boy
out of the crib. The baby wouldn’t
stop crying and the man shook his
infant son but caught himself and
put the screaming baby back down.
That baby went on to be an All-Amer-
ican swimmer, scholar and Ironman
Tri-Athlete. The man shuddered at
the thought of what might have been
but, by grace, wasn’t and never
would be.

He thought of the 70’s
and the wonderful poetry
of the “beats”
and how some of those beats
seemed to
beat a retreat
to the 60’s
and
then he turned 70
and popped a
bunionette on one
of his
feet,
so it’s a little
more difficult now
for him
to beat a retreat
on those feet
or even go forward
very fast
for that matter
so he’ll sit at the computer
and try to imitate
those beats.

The birds are back, flying
in and out of our back
yard, screen-less aviary.
Black-capped Chickadees,
pushy Black Crows, Rose-
breasted Grosbeaks, Eastern
Bluebirds, bossy Bluejays,
American Goldfinches,
White-crowned Sparrows,
Cedar Waxwings, Northern
Cardinals and two Mourn-
ing Doves, who move slowly
around the pond over the
bridge between the pond
and waterfall doting on
each other like love-sick
love birds. And then like a
Jerome Robbins’ choreo-
graphed moment where
all the dancers stop on
cue, the birds fell silent.
My wife and I looked up
from the fire in the fire
pit and one, lone Mocking-
bird, assigned to speak
for everyone as usual, step-
ped out on a limb and asked,
“Why did you come back so
soon from Arizona? We’ve
got icicles on our beaks
and we’re freezing our
feathery asses off. But
as long as you are here,
the bird feeders are empty
and we’re all hungry,
especially the damn Blue-
jays, as usual.” “Well,
Welcome home to you, too,”
I said, “I suppose I could
ask you all the same
question, but I won’t
because you might get
mad and all fly away, like
fair feathered friends, so
if you’ll excuse me, I’ll
just go get you some bird
seed. And tell the Bluejays
to back off, please, a lot
of good that will do.”

Tracing the steps of a dead
and nearly forgotten poet, the
writer wrote of the poet’s home-
town, “The main highway through
town is an anywhere drag of Super
8s, Hardee’s, Taco Bells, and
Sonics. There’s a megachurch on
the outskirts of town, its parking
lot as big as a Wal-Mart’s.” Mother
had lived in that town around the
time the almost forgotten poet did
before the town’s main drag was
anywhere U.S.A. with her second
husband who ducked out of Chicago
to fish the big lakes tucked be-
tween the Arkansas hills, but acc-
identally put the pedal to the
metal in reverse while putting his
boat in the icy spring water and
put the car in, too and mother
became a widow for the second,
sudden time. As in the wake of
the first fast death, she spent
considerable time in a mental hos-
pital coping and recuperating. My
wife and I drive through a lot of
same Main Streets with Wal-Mart,
McDonald’s, Motel 6 and, well, you
get the picture, going to and from
Michigan and Arizona. Because, the
town my now dead mother and the also
now dead poet lived in in Arkansas
had a nice Main Street back when she
lived there, when I go through all
the towns that look like what her
former town looks like today, I don’t
think of mother and her hard life or
that town. I just get depressed
looking at the towns I’m driving
through wondering, What town is
this?