On the Day That He Goes, I Will
for Avery
think of you first.& then I will think of you again:
Your belongings—Stripey, a whoopee cushion—my heart,
stowed in secret—will lurchpitching, heaving, tumbling,
behind my breastbone,will stagger toward an image seared into
my chestthe shape of my own grandfather standing near
a bingo hopperthe mailbox, draft card in hand—
& the stunned aftermaththe effect numbers have on our lives: of age five,
of a roiling 6.9 tremorof eighteen years old &
all at oncealready gone.
