Poem: Those Who Remember

Those Who Remember

 

I wonder why certain deaths break my heart

even as I think of life death life death, breathing out in

as a beating heart, not a broken one 

and obedient lungs.

 

The aching ones are often not the ones I’d expect.

 

Maybe it’s when death is unexpected 

for them

for me

unexpected names, memories

from too many beats ago

my reckless disregard or too great certainty

the wrong kind

for what is certain is the end.

 

Maybe it’s when there are children, left forever

well, not forever, not for them either

who look so alike, are so much like them

they might not have left at all.

 

Sometimes I can’t even catch my breath or

slow my mind to catch up to the absence

of people who had been absent

for whom I’d been absent

for so long

 

or maybe not long at all

 

a single beat.

 

Always, then

I hug my son,

go for a walk or out to dinner with him

we come back home

and I get back at it

isn’t that awful

just keep going with one more ache

one more wound 

until it stops

and the wound is for others 

 

for those who’ve forgotten me

and for those who remember.

 

When I read this poem, I recall the words at the end of my long autobiographical piece Bowling in Chicago, which concludes: “This I know: The people you love, you always love.”

 

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I invite you to explore other poems I’ve shared:

• To Have and to Hold Until Death Has No Part
• My Father’s Hands, in memoriam
• late dreams, autumn
• Boulevard Park, Bellingham
• Why Cats Stay in Abusive Relationships
• Round the Corner
• Oldest River
• Dare
• Favorite Person