Poem: Taters, No Gravy
I accept my small life.
I will read my books and play with my dogs I will visit Grandma until she is gone
Fridays, I will go to the chess club and hope my game runs long Saturdays, I will visit my parents until they are gone
I will never play centerfield for the Cardinals I can’t hit, catch, or throw
I might have been the heavyweight champion but suspect I can’t throw or take the blows
As a boy I wanted to be a superhero, to fight for what’s right but the only crime I have witnessed is the running of a red light
I will never make a mortgage payment with pay from my writing two hundred rejection letters are stacked where that dream used to be
I will go on reading Roth, Cohen, Dickens and Dickinson, Hemingway, Kipling, Bronte and Bronte (I never cared much for the third) reading and wishing I could do what they do
I will go on writing words no other eyes will read there’s pleasure in writing them too
My life will continue to be one of increasing solitude I accept it
Acceptance is the only silver bullet, after the trying is tried, for that want of what won’t be had
I wanted a wife and kids in truth, I want that still but it’s the reward at the end of a maze and I lack the navigational skills
Whatever makes a woman stay I haven’t got it
At every fork in the road I make the wrong turn
When I spoke she just wanted me to listen
When I listened I was supposed to speak
One wanted more length, girth, and some specific sort of curve in the end she called it off claiming I didn’t like her church
One said she wanted to have children, I said I wanted that too she slapped me and said she wanted someone to love her, not her womb
I bought flowers for one in a vase draped in silk, I gave her chocolates in a box shaped like a heart but her heart was broken because I forgot, she had told me she liked dark, not milk I dated one who was a round 200 pounds thinking we could be fat together caring nothing for the aesthetic she decided to wait for someone more athletic
There have been four women I loved two of them loved me back
The memory of the love can live in my house my house with three bedrooms and one bed
I have my books I have my dogs I have my Grandma for awhile and my parents awhile longer than that I have the memory of love though the lovers have left
Surely taters with gravy is best but I see those with only gravy and am grateful for my taters