ode to the afternoon

my friend tells me she’s been running

in the cemetery in the afternoon

she calls it just-a-garden-really

first i am afraid & then i am afraid

everything is cemetery & garden

my late uncle’s flower shop

my daughter learning to fold a paper into a boat

sea salt marriage dawn old french music

this vertical line digging deeper

into my forehead every morning

that bicycle in the city tied to a street post

with flowers & a note to the girl who rode it

 

when i was a little girl i wanted to bury the afternoon

when longing was long & my parents slept & slept

i stood in the corridor & repeated i i i i i until i

flickered in & out of myself some days i even

threatened to fling my body from the balcony until

my brother with such calm looked at me

dangling from the railing my head thrown back

& explained you don’t own your soul

it belongs to God only He can decide

 

i stood in the corridor i stood on the balcony

i stood in the desolate afternoon & repeated

because what is repetition

if not a question the way mom every day

with her hair dryer with her grocery list

with her buying this shawl & that

is asking what have i done what have i done

 

the book says we will see clearly

when the drunkenness of death falls upon us

my uncle saw a man & a woman

standing by his hospital window

& asked his wife who they were

 

my father with his prayer beads

with his cigarette gestured to the driver

taking my uncle to his grave

to circle back & pass

by his flower shop my father

with his few words said

one last time so he

by he my father meant both

his brother & himself

 

my uncle taught me to sing que sera sera

he said say it what will be will be

i still dread the afternoon & still ask

will i be pretty will i be missed

& i still haven’t been

to his grave but have driven

past his flower shop again & again & again

the way on the night he died i drove beneath bridges

& saw him on each one & waved