Lines and Phrases
Walking the dog, I hear the boy in the neighbor’s pool
call to another boy, I’m going to beat you like a Cherokee
drum.
There’s an open palm on the water’s surface followed
by spray and a scream as if one is being killed by another.
Their dog sees mine and begins to bark and the mother turns
from where she sits to look me in the eye.
Later, I learn the line is from a movie I’ll pass on—as in to skip,
not as in to give an object to or repeat, as I do those phrases
that sometimes rise to the surface, inherited:
I don’t give a rat’s ass and Too bad, so sad.
My grandmother’s stated lack of empathy, carried forward
from her to her to me, though she knew well how to wash a cut
and bandage.
Would kneel and ask if everything was better
while my mother stood, claiming I cried at the drop of a hat.
Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.
We begin to babble around six months, form recognizable words
around the first year. We listen and model. Listen and model.
He’d totter about, naming chair, cup, light. She’d stretch out
her arms after a long day with me, say Up, Da.
You talking to me?
Someone said we eventually turn into our mothers. We catch
ourselves with their words in our mouth.
Once, I was told to use my words—this in the months after
my mother died. My stomping about solved nothing, got me nowhere.
What we’ve got here is failure to communicate, he drawled.
That one I knew.
Even later, the pool is still.
Now this line tossed off. Now this one.
Pain: Every 4 to 6 Hrs.
It could be that this is not what is found
written on the bottle but, rather, what I
have grown accustomed to: a state of.
As organized as I am, the regularity of
the pain is plausible. I check the weather
at 7, at noon, at 7. I replace my water
pitcher’s filter on the first of every month
every three months. I go to the dentist
every six. So, every four to six seems right.
What was it, diabetic as she was, she did
when she must? And we called her
the responsible one. It’s the necessary
shorthand that gets me: not for pain, just
pain. Also, how important the every
must have been/is, to have demanded/
demand space. The bottle is as old as I
am, found on the dining-room table
of a woman I’ll probably never see
again. He took a picture of it and sent it
to him, who shared it with me, who
recognized myself in that faded scrawl.
