hanging out of mouth, no signs of
regret, smoke rises and the tobacco
gets lesser with time, he says
the 88-year-old mother of his
still lives in a tin-roof shack
in the mountains of western North Carolina --
O and his old-boy accent belongs there too! --
a real woman, this man's mother,
disappointed because she only
killed four squirrels this year,
damn unusual winter, warm too.
Tough, he says, patting his knee, tough
is life, a bullet through the leg, Vietnam,
four inches from the artery, wouldn't be
sitting here, but for that miss, fate like
a young man and fast cars, speeding hurriedly
down residential streets and into a lamp post
killing his passenger. These war stories
and young-man stories make me the saddest.
Raleigh, NC
3-12-2012
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