Sequestration

(This is an evolving story. I keep adding verses until I'm done.)



When I was 
eighty-two, 
I went to live alone 
knowing the money would 
forever be coming. 
Going away felt appropriate 
for a man my age. 
The closest analog 
to the womb 
and to death. 
To be alive, 
clothed in the 
warmth of certainty 
amid my own unchallenged opinions
during the age of ending, 
out of the business 
of a bright, moving planet 
my own part in the world 
outdated and roots 
severed. 

I found a place
in the middle of the trees 
with a thin asphalt egress 
that made it easy 
to cycle to the village. 
I was surrounded by 
the aliens of the earth 
with their secret languages 
and concentrated lives. 
I truly lived among strangers, 
not those wanting to know me 
or able to know me. 
It was like the world 
before I opened my eyes. 
It was here and far away.

Delivered here in a storm 
under which the taxi 
and me 
and the driver 
were as tiny as sugar molecules. 
The driver introduced himself as Charles. 
He is a black man from Aruba, 
Charles an English royal name. 
I ran to the door 
holding a newspaper on my head 
as Charles soaked himself 
carrying my black bags.
Copyright © | Year Posted 2013

Poem

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