What did you say?
I cannot hear you
Please
Turn the volume up
On the TV
Cannot hear what anyone is saying
Either
Never mind commercials
It is called
Sudden Hearing Loss
Suddenly my left ear
Was like
Plugged
Far off sounds
Filtered through
Crazy weird
Ah
But the hearing
Test
Did not lie
Suddenly
There was indeed
Sudden Hearing Loss
In my left ear
Well okay
Things could be a lot
Worse a lot
Worse
Tigray of Northern Ethiopia
Ukraine borders Russia
They have become the background of
My hours
Hours
That seep into my
Days
Hover over my
Nights
What is wrong with
You
Abiy Ahmed
Vladimir Putin
I have deposited you
On the scrolls of
Infamy
That haunt memories
From
Millennium to millennium
Your bombs your tanks
Your soldiers
Willing to follow your
Commands
To destroy Life
As every woman man
And child
Once Lived it
What is wrong
With you
What cancer
Devours the essence of your
Humanity
-April 18, 2022
Grandmother is old, she is frail
I am one-hundred years
She says, though only ninety-seven
Her fingers trace patterns on the lap robe
And she watches as they move
To the right, to the left
I am nervous, she says
I am nervous
Then her hands lie open
On her thighs
Palms touching the blue wool
She lifts them up, then down
Slowly, again and again
I sit in a chair
Close to the one that enfolds her
Cover her hands with mind
And feel the flutter of her nerves
Like a thousand butterflies
That struggle for release
From their cocoons
*Written 1982, from 2001’s Poet’s are the bravest.
In a memory of childhood
She leans over my bed
She lifts the blanket cover
And puts her hand between the sheets
Then
Flutters her fingers in the darkness
Where I sleep at the bottom
It is Wednesday
The nurse has half-day out
Nana comes to wake me from
My nap
Pulls up the window shades
Sees the place near my pillow
Where I tear the wallpaper
Off the wall
Says nothing
The peacocks
At the Lincoln Park Zoo
Wail
I cover my ears with my hands
To muffle the noise
She takes peanuts from a paper bag
Holds one in her fingers
Between the iron bars
And waits
The ducks come to snap the peanut
From her fingers
Like the cook jabs potatoes
With a fork for baking
She says I may have a peanut
To feed the ducks
Holds the paper bag open for me
But I am afraid to put my fingers through
The iron rails of the fence
She laughs
Says
Don’t be a goosie
They won’t bite
It is Wednesday afternoon
At the Lincoln Park Zoo
She wears a woolen suit
And ruffled blouse
Her gray hair under a feathered hat
I remember the feel of her cotton glove
In my hand
And the sound of her shoes
On the pavement
*Written 1982, from 2001’s Poet’s are the bravest.