Just a couple of older poems.
I get my breath.
You know, that didn't work at all, did it?
This is a poem called The Milky Way.
When we first came down to Tucson
my son, who was then three years old
came down with juvenile diabetes.
And because he was misdiagnosed almost died.
The poem is about that.
About his recovery from it and about my childhood.
The Milky Way.
When I was a boy, the Milky Way floated just
over the city of Boston so I was lucky to live in that place.
That house where my father lathered his face
and like the moon went out, came back, walking winter nights
beneath the Milky Way.
Few thoughts, few fears, a way of sleeping through the night.
When my son lay sewn to the sheets
adrift in his diabetic coma among the blown seductive
stars, I could not think of anything
to say for he was not anywhere nearby.
He said, papa, and came back.
Tonight in his play he captains a sleek starship
toward the Milky Way.
When I was a boy the city of Boston
lay miles away within our sight.
Evenings we set our chairs upon the lawn and talked.
Few thoughts, a way of watching until dark.
Then as our small wicker's floated through the night,
I wished I might be taken away to live forever
in that distant city made wholly of light.