Questions

…I wrote this in response to the June 28th prompt at Big Tent Poetry
and for prompt #59 at Carry On Tuesday


 

Questions

•

he lifts himself quietly
from beneath the sheets
soiled with neglect

makes his way carefully
past the shallow-breathed crumple
that lay milky-eyed in a heap
un-moving on the floor
save a twitch of the sodden head

this wreckage is his mother

why do you just lie there mother
my head is full of demons son

the response only imagined
she remains slack and death-like
where nocturne angels of sweet release
had laid down lush upon her
in fevered embrace
lustfully conjured
by last night’s spoon and lance
still skewered silver in the soured vein

mother — why do you want to die
the return is only silence

he lingers but a moment
verifying life
then moves on
head down

he angles to the bathroom
to the scum-brown bowl
to wash his face
a face lit sallow by the yellowed bulb
that hangs bare and lonely

eyes of knowing
eyes of sadness
stare into the mirror
broken as his heart
then close

your eyes hold a story my son
will you tell me your story

yes mother
if you really want to hear about it
if you really could

• • •

rob kistner © 2010


19 thoughts on “Questions”

    1. Thank you Maureen. This is a third, and significant rewrite, of a draft I began in 1998. It is drawn from a very sad situation, of several decades ago, that involved a young woman who was a member of my band at the time. It left a most indelible memory…

  1. a truly sad story written from knowing. always enjoy the timeI spend here. you take me to another place…another world…a place where I can observe and learn and not be seen…thanks

  2. Sometimes, silence can be an unhealable wound, yet also a gift that allows change and the altering of the end of the story. This is incredibly powerul,
    Rob, thank you for going back, reworking, and bringing it to daylight.

    Elizabeth

  3. I’m glad you revisited this piece, too. Those things that are etched in our souls, scream to be dealt with in writing. You handled this memory well. It is a tragedy repeated too often in the world. Giving it voice is important.

    1. I am pleased this work touched you Brenda, as the memory touches me — and I agree devastating situations such as these must be voiced…

      …rob

    1. The mother OD’d Mary, the son went to his grandparents, then on to graduate school and marriage — but since I moved to the Pacific Northwest two decades ago, I’ve lost touch over the years…

      …rob

  4. Compelling, sad, familiar. Nicely done. Unafraid to address the ugliness, like that sad yellow bulb or the brown bowl, but still transformative, in a way.

  5. Those moments of rhyme and rhythm in free verse can be so wonderful as they are here. The imagery in this is very vivid. Well done.

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