No Rubber Ducks Today
Today there are no rubber ducks, no flawless hues,
To hide behind, as we once did.
This day is dark, and gray and dreary,
Air thick with the scent of decay and mold,
Dull light filters in through the window,
Casting a somber tone across everything.
Even the freesia suds have gone bad,
The water in the tub is murky, opaque and grim,
Waves unseparated as the day that holds them.
When we were good kids, peering out,
From behind our good mother,
We got good glimpses, sucked on butterscotch chips,
The new neighbor, the smell of fresh sunflowers; it was fun.
But the old neighbor, who finally stopped coming around,
He was not good,
Over steeped dandelion tea, a benign-sounding thing,
Bitter and dry, sometimes salty; it was not fun.
As gray as this day, as this water, when I knew him,
He knew me, too.
I sink deeper into the swirling, whirling, and I think of things,
Dirty-water cyclone, the brightness of our childhood,
Harder to recall, I still remember the rubber ducks though.
Splashing them about, their cheerful colors and silly grins,
We knew joy,
But that bright spot is fading, and soon it too will disappear,
Down the drain, with this gray water and my leftover filth.
Mixing it all together,
In the stillness of the moment, I am struck,
The heavy inevitability of happiness; the transience of loss.
As bad as this day, that man, with his dreary gray hues,
I hang my head back and give a loud, guttural laugh at it now,
The memory of those yellow, plastic birds.
Especially since today there are no rubber ducks, no flawless hues,
To hide behind, as we once did.
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