All I have left of my grandfather
is his hands,
his way of standing
soldier straight.

Of my grandmother, I have her
gravelly voice,
the smoke curling upward 
in the dark of the night.

Of my aunt, the
nickname she called me–
Bee-dee-beep.

And my uncle,
the sound of his laughter,
his tipsy stumble the last Christmas,
his nap with socks on
in the bedroom in the corner.

How long is left
until I’ve lost
all the pieces
of the people I love?

I took a tour through my father’s childhood–
the house on Coles Boulevard,
the hill where his elementary used to be.
We drove down main street and 
he told me all the names 
of stores no longer there.
We stopped by the church 
where my grandmother misheard
that Hare Krishnas were in the sanctuary
instead of hairy creatures.

I asked the questions I never had,
learned things I never knew.
No one still alive knows how my 
grandparents met.
My grandfather ran the motor pool
in World War II.
How my great-grandmother, my namesake
put up with my raving lunatic
of a great-grandfather.
(The reason
I can never marry 
a man named Frank.)

Sweet blood, tobacco in the air
lifts conversation to a plane so rare
that I can see the Indian red tobacco grow
at the overflow end of the chicken row
and feel the sanctity of an inner office
where a friend hides in authority.
Trust takes me back to certainty
in even my meanderings.
I sit again at the melamine surface
of the trailer’s fold-out table where
I was given license to know.  

I praise the providence my parents
gave me, setting me out underneath
the stars. Grandparents, teachers,
suspicious friends, I thank you all.
I witness glory in consumption,
the poets’ feeding frenzy,
floating their identities past Mars.  

The two of us
hung our underwear out to dry
on the balcony,
unprepared for rain, for luggage gone astray,
for foreign buses,
thieving teenagers on the subway,
and women begging in the market
with their nipples hanging over
sleeping babies.

The two of us stood in the rain 
to see the Sistine Chapel,
Accidentally heard the Pope
give mass on New Year’s Day,
Ate coconut fresh from the hull
after dropping our coins in 
Trevi Fountain.

The two of us 
stood in the Colosseum and the Circus Maximus,
put our hands in the Mouth of Truth,
Saw holy relics, famous sculptures,
and gilded ceilings. 

The two of us
made memories to last 
a lifetime.

Slide this syllable and that one together and you
Get the light fading from blue through orange, purple and pink.
Put that syllable with another,
And you get laughter,
Toes dangling in the air,
Arms pumpin,
Falling through the air 
To thump back to the ground.

Even then, these syllables together
Mean nothing
To the Italian or the German,
The Chinese or African.

All these syllables floating around,
waiting to be scooped up by tongue
or pen to paint the pictures
in our minds.

If my words could shake time,
oceans of mistakes bearing ill tidings until morning breaks,
perhaps things would be different.
I’ve watched the static of silence scrawl itself across your skin,
a life in flames watching a torrent of wandering days lose themselves
in the cataclysmic arms of eternity.
(Seven years old, searching for miracles in plastic eggs.
Each minute a new discovery etches itself out in smiles and
dyes the day in hues of laughter.)
Flash forward; a young man now, Ben stands by his grandfather’s coffin,
eight days away from lying in one of his own.
Tears sear tracks in a face of cracking stone, hesitating for but a moment
on trembling lips.
He will go from being a pallbearer to being buried in just over a week.
The songs held within his chest weave spiderweb fissures
into the fabric of perfection.
You’re not old enough to sleep yet.
There were white horses under the hood of that truck-
three tons of shattered tomorrows ensure
you don’t come back from things like this.
The harp of your voice has no place in a call to dispatch, kid.
I know, I’ve read your story enough times to understand
your brightest desire was to leave behind the love
you held within every breath.
There ain’t a prize inside that box.
Hours spent peeling away a tin lid
looking for an answer we already know.
The last picture of you tattooed on my retinas:
tear-stained, cigarette eternally planted between your lips
and burning.
Somewhere, I hope you’re still dancing.

One more day to write a poem – 
Can I salvage some elusive thoughts 
That never made it to paper?
Like finally fundamentally understanding why Elvis was shocking? 
Or how it is hard to put flowers on only one side of a grave –
How some days the way the light hits the barns is profound
and I am moved to tears
but not for you.

I. they say eatin’ pussy 
   is the devil’s work
   so i go down
   on you
   like i’m
   possessed

II. you suck
     my dick
     in noah’s ark
     at the bible themed
     putt putt course 
     like it’s the only hope
     of saving 
     the species