Even Later

POETRY

by Marty Krasney

It was like this. Surprisingly so.
We had turned into two quite old men,
estranged, I the elder, though the more spry.

We lay propped side by side on our backs
in twin beds, linen pillowcases, plush comforters, stuffed animals,
upstairs, in the spare room just beneath the eaves.

An awkward angled space, two narrow gabled windows, musty,
maybe where the maids had slept way back when,
or cousins, visiting the great house at Christmastime.

He must have suggested that we talk there, drinks in hand,
though he remained disinclined to say much of anything
and every one of my questions went unanswered.

His wife, my sister, was near death, on the second floor,
in the immense and lavishly curated master bedroom
that they had continued to inhabit for more than half a century.

He had just purchased a large ranch near Aspen, he finally
revealed, a place where he knew I had lived in my youth;
for afterwards, he said with a ferocity that took his breath away.

Finished coughing, he asked what I thought of things. Of the world.
Assuming he meant China, his longtime passion; I started to,

but, no, it was regarding a bestseller, the Seventh Something . . .

Did I know it? Furious, he careened into the hallway to retrieve the book,
hurling paperbacks from the tall cases at me there on the bed;
his aim was still good, and his strength, and two hit hard on my chest.

But he couldn’t locate the one that he had hoped to show me,
and he shuffled back into the little room in despair, weeping,

mumbling that it was impossible now to find anything that mattered.