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kevinjtaylor
Member
Posts 61
British Columbia, Canada

0 posted 2018-11-20 10:02 AM


The Sunrise was a low-end hotel on Hastings Street in Vancouver. The bed-in-a-trunk sequence was as described. The orange juice had a sleeping drug in it and the trunk-bed was used to separate children from parents or guardians without a fuss. '61. Alberta, Canada.


This—  This is the closest we have been in
forty-seven years.  Graveside, I close my
eyes. See again, her lips smeared, her head
turned, as she had lain unconscious.  Whispers
of Other Men—   Immoral—   Immoral living—  
Declared unfit for motherhood and I am only
days from four.  

Before that, in white shift sitting at the foot of
her bed, singing quietly to herself. Singing,
brushing and lifting her hair.  Letting it fall.
She is lovely to me. Later that night, weeping,
anger, fists and cries.  

At fifty-one I look like him. Fist-Man. Father.  
He wept in Irish taverns filled with weeping,
singing drunks.  She had danced the Sunrise on
Hastings, whatever that meant.  

She was gone when I was taken. I was gone if
she returned.  

A Child Welfare office filled with nervous women,
children dressed in Sunday-best and a faint wash
of fear—   these memories, all memories,
discomfit and jar.  

A metal cup with orange juice—warm, sweet
and slightly bitter.  The far end of the room.
A bed made in a wooden trunk.  Eyes slipping.
Box lid closing. Sleep—  

Bewildered, pushing, opened, the room lies
stark, white and empty.  No mothers.  No children.
No one waiting here.  The lump that rises to my
throat is the same one— the same one that rises
in spasms from my chest on that dark-boxed,
white-roomed and room-filled afternoon.  

In forty-seven years I would stand above
her on that overlooking hill. No words
to mark her place, a plot numbered between
other unmarked and numbered graves.  Maybe
she was gone again. Gone before I could
tell her what had happened, that I was sorry,
that I would be a good boy, beg her— find me.  

Eyes opened, I have waited long enough.
The sun is hot. White lines trail across the sky.
Paper from one pocket. Pen from another.
I write. Roll tight and push as far in as
this ground will allow.  

White paper, ink. Graveside for her. Wayside
for me.  A mark was kept. A mark was left.  

A deep breath in, not held and out.



© Copyright 2018 kevinjtaylor - All Rights Reserved
2islander2
Member Ascendant
since 2008-03-12
Posts 6825
by the sea
1 posted 2018-11-20 05:02 PM


such a sad "story",a poem very well written and keep highest interest all along, thank you


yann

JerryPat2
Member Laureate
since 2011-02-06
Posts 16975
South Louisiana
2 posted 2018-11-20 09:53 PM


A wonderful poem, of which you made it sound so realistic. These, from the heart poems, are poems I am so personal that I love seeing, and  them.This one was exceptionally good.

~ If they give you ruled paper, write sideways. ~

OwlSA
Member Rara Avis
since 2005-11-07
Posts 9347
Durban, South Africa
3 posted 2018-11-26 03:02 AM


I am hoping SO hard that this is fiction . . . though even if it is, as you said elsewhere, it is truer than truth for some.  I fought the tears, but they won.  
kevinjtaylor
Member
Posts 61
British Columbia, Canada
4 posted 2018-11-26 09:08 AM


Hi OwlSA. The tale is real. Time is compressed instead of more spread out but the tale is no less real. Some of it is as I have been told. Other parts are from memory. I cried too.
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