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Poem

A heron watched me 
from painted rushes,
brush-stroked by a man 
who lived in a wagon
lacquered with stars 
and road-dust and wind,
who sometimes drank too much
and thundered.
They say he wandered for years,
trading canvases for bread, 
for gas, for silence—
until his heart gave out 
beneath a turquoise sky.
His wagon still sat out back,
faded scallops of red and gold
peeling like secrets 
no one quite remembered.

Inside, the air was musty
and warm but cooler
than the desert outside,
as if time itself 
had drawn the curtains.
The woman behind the counter
looked up without surprise,
as though she’d been expecting me
for years.
Wearing turquoise rings
on every finger,
she spoke in a voice that cracked
like sunbaked earth.

I found a Camel lighter,
dense plastic, off-yellow,
cool in my palm
like something meant to be forgotten—
but it still worked.
Next to it, a metal vase—
tall, cylindrical,
with etched art deco rings
and a nick near the rim,
perfect to hold my brushes.
The heron stood in a leaning row
of secondhand paintings,
its eye fixed on something
just beyond me.
“Painted by the wagon man,” she said.
“That one never sold—
he kept it by his bed.”
So I bought it too.

That was years ago and I
meant to come back
but never did,
and now the store and wagon
are gone—
but I remember its goofy name:
Xemidoofnac.
The vase still holds my brushes,
stained with work and waiting.
The lighter sleeps in a drawer
with old marbles and foreign coins,
its flame long gone 
but still sparking memory.
The heron hangs in the hallway,
eye still fixed on something
I haven’t reached.
And sometimes, when the house is quiet,
I wonder if he knows—
that someone came,
and saw,
and bought a piece
he meant to keep—
in remembrance.

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