Disclosure

Know that I never went to sea.
Know all my screams are in vain
or hunger; my eyes are bloodshot
from too much sleep, not for lacking.
Know in my opinion John is not the walrus.
Know all of that and everything else
I have forgotten to say.

For years I have sung all the songs
worn all the right shirts, worn out
the grooves of countless vinyl records.
All for nothing. I know it, too.

**

Admission

The space between us is not a void.
It’s not all the things I wish it could be.
Nor can I just pick up and leave it behind.
I can see straight through it, so there’s no use lying.
Unlike hope, it cannot fly away.
For clarity’s sake know that I know you built it.
Yet, it is your master now.
For the record, I would not destroy it even if I could.
I can still see the blue skies at night.
In that darkness I know somewhere there is comfort.
I know you can hear me.

When you die there will be a great fire
burning, raging in the sky. I will still be lost at sea
and I will use the light you cast to navigate
and find my way home. Not knowing the compass
I will simply sail my boat in the opposite direction.

**

Confession

Going away has never been more lovely than
watching death shade your eyes. A small breeze
lifts up my spirit like a leaf caught in its dance
as it scuttles from west to east, scraping
the pavement still wet from a mild rain. I am
alone again in my thoughts, left to gently rock
with the ebb and flow of this estuary.

Forget what you have read.
All is not forgiven. So long
as one of us lives, there is this
final, solitary burden of proof.

**

Letter to My Imaginary Siblings

after Linda Paston

To my brothers and sisters—
the ones I imagine as opposed to the twelve
I already have but do not know. This letter
is for you. I know you because I conjured you out of thin air
while the brothers and sisters who are real, the ones
with whom I am bound by familial law
I do not know. To you I wonder if we will ever sit
together, telling each other the stories of our imagined lives,
writing them as our grandmother has with her siblings,
for posterity and the curious generations to follow.
It is my hope that we can all be there for at least
one family photo where everyone but Alan
will smile into the camera. His death was tragic
but we have lived with that loss so long our pain
is more like a longing for Spring in mid-winter.
Most of us have lived enough to have children. Me
with my three boys, you with sons and daughters as well.
(You not being real I can only guess.) We should meet
in Autumn, a metaphor for looking back. With the leaves
falling around us, we can sit down to eat a meal,
finally laugh with some ease.