SING
THERE WILL BE SOMETHING TO SING ABOUT
Am I watching him? Or is he watching me? I feel his
eyes every morning from my Juliet balcony No doubt
he has seen much of my body Today he is in pastels
This rotund man My fire escape nemesis Doppelgänger
of the man in my dreamscape at 36 who bellowed:
SECOND HALF OF LIFE!
In Judaism 36 is double chai Chai is life This 2nd half
of life is tricky thorny A crucifixion Jesus was crucified
at 33 just before he entered the threshold No knee replacements
Viagra or anti- d’s Here on this side there is a certain amount of
rage involved
Rage and redemption through suffering the fire +brimstone years
of becoming your wizened Self As your ghost’s ghost watches from
the shadows and knows that: We were together here once Before the
letting go of hands the dropping off one at a time the losses without
anesthesia
Even the losses of earlier selves Hopeful lubricated selves with plump
lips +pliable arteries Yesterday a depressed brother (more depressed than
me) told us he’d heard why it is that time feels like it’s sped up exponentially
It’s because when you’re young there are always new things to savour New
experiences New people The first first Now it’s all the same
As we sat there in a yearning silence our mother 93 nodded knowingly: It’s
an assembly line of bad food +psychiatric social workers who humour you
with bagels from your home town And by the way can you get me tickets to
a baseball game? Her 19 year old self in a white fox collar scented with Emeraude
A sporty suit +gloves pulled up a chair Right there as we ate mediocre panino
on the bread of our affliction
__
*Emeraude was launched in 1921. The nose behind this fragrance is Francois Coty. Top notes are orange, bergamot and lemon; middle notes are jasmine, ylang-ylang, rose and brazilian rosewood; base notes are amber, sandalwood, patchouli, opoponax, benzoin and vanilla.
Summer 2017 for Frances Lechaim!
