Gene Flew

In our sophomore annual
is a picture of a touchdown
we made in the championship

game against Loranger.
I donít have it before me,
and I canít recall who carried

the ball into the zone
or which of our three scores
that particular one was,

but never mind the lost details
because I am here to tell you
that what matters

about this photograph is how
high Gene Belcher has risen
in celebration of the pointsó

his knees drawn up
into cannonball position,
his arms extended

like wings, the tips of his cleats
too far above the turf to say
and not be thought a liar

since no head is higher
and not everyone is bowed
with the effort of the play.

Gene was the only white tenth-grader
who started that season,
during which we won fourteen

straight to ease our town
through the early months
of integration, autumn 1970.

He was the best of us, called
on by coaches in all seasons
because he had been blessed

in ways that sometimes surprised
even him, as when he vaulted
for the first time and took District.

Naturally we talked about that,
told story after story
the night we buried him.

Those who were in the bottom
for the last hunt said they knew
he was gone when he fell.

They said he went down
with his arms tucked,
making no attempt to protect

himself as anyone would do,
having tripped or stumbled,
thus becoming the first of us

whose time simply ran out,
the heart that pumped so well
on so many fields failing him

as his doctors said it would
if he didnít keep diligent watch.
This was a new kind of loss for usó

others had been swallowed
by water, crushed by steel,
players in accidents of fate,

not proof of how frail we are,
how delicate, how poorly made.
Surely no man can know another,

but I have always suspected
that Gene was too busy flying
to watch anything except

what he could see from up there,
his wife and boys, his family
and friends, those of us

he ascended to celebrate,
the bomb in his chest ticking
him down, silent as gravity.

***
Summers Then

Summers then seemed endless
because we had every hour
of them to ourselves
to do with as we pleased.

Days we swam
until our fingertips softened
into tissuey wrinkles
and we had to squint,
water having scorched
our wide-open eyes.

Done with that and fed,
we waited for the sun
to sink, its final light
painting the sky colors
we took no more notice of
than we did of the brief moment
they were available to us.

Nights we ran
until we reached places to hide
in the shadows that settled
upon the damp grasses
of our neighborhood
and waited for chances
to test our speed,
our will to get home free.

Done with that and bathed,
we slept
beneath paddling fans
and dreamed,
no longer able
even to imagine
a thing so distant as winter.