Where the arrow points

The doctor's wrinkles hide his thoughts
I cannot see what he feels as he
speaks to my love about kidneys.



The trained hands hold an image
to the light to show two dark fists
spread like wings
across my darling's spine.



A million tiny filters are failing
in their God-given duty to cleanse
my husband's blood

so a new diet is ordered,
without a hint of taste,
that must begin tonight
if we are to rescue those
bean shapes off the cliff
from which they dangle.



Only a month before, he says
Let's go to Spain.
He longs for a shaded cafe,
a sip of Tinto Fino.

In his dream, he wears a long white shirt
and a black fedora
and he admires attractive passers by
and they in turn admire
his avalanche of white hair and even whiter
teeth and that leading man jaw.



He leaves the office nervous
but optimistic.

My man does not understand
the next 2 years may be a slow,
moonless descent.



But I do.


I see the levels on the doctor's chart.
I see the arrow on the word: dialysis.
I see no arrow points to Spain.






Rising from the lawn (Mother's Day)

Because she's gone I can talk
about my mother.

I can say she was not the best
nor the worst on the spectrum.

I can say she was not really
like a mother. She was ardent

like a lover, at times
like my worst enemy.

If she were here, she would be
a 101 year old chainsmoker

with hair arrayed like a wedding
cake that would sag under her laugh.

I can say she would scold me
for being too serious and when I

complain, she’d recite an uplifting
line from a famous German sage

fortelling how people cry out
for their mothers

once they are gone
and then cast her eyes to heaven
like a wounded bird.

She would remind me how much
angst she endured for her children

and tell me again to spade her
beside my dad and to visit her there

often because it's the only way
she can rise from that silent lawn.