Thursday, October 1, 2020

How is it we are strangers?

First you crawl to me 

then your first steps 

circle my legs 

and boom! 

you are taller than me 

and you run for the plane

and vanish from 

some windy platform 

as if swooped up 

by a hawk. 


How is it that you and I are strangers 

when yesterday we lived in this world 

laced like a vine on a trellis? 

Here in this same town, same house

making the same bean and cheese burrito? 


The shrink's diagnosis: manhood.  

He says you will cross many rivers 

many times, many bridges on your journey. 


He says that's life: one day manhood 

seems so far ahead and boom! 

one day a man stands before you.


Sobered, I walk the trail home 

and meet a sweet horse that gallops 

along the gate, he eager 

to keep pace and I think 

of my boy. 


Each night comes a dream of you 

on your bike, 

you racing beside me,



the joy on your face. 

My joy.