Looking back,
yesterday is pale.
Yesterday is hazy.
Did I dance yesterday?
Did I fall?
Please help me remember any crimes of my past
that I might have forgotten
in the face of their antiquity.
I seem sore.
What did I do?
Who did I hurt?
Whom? I never can seem to recall.
What happened?
Are there survivors?
I simply
cannot think straight
about the events of that far-gone
long away age of yesterday.
I hope I had a good time.
I hope it was worth it.
If I hear
that kind of language from you again
I will beat the living shit out of you.
Do you hear me?
I will fucking tear your head off
and then begin to skullrape
first one part
then another
until my jizz is dripping
off of each and every orifice
created by the violence
and the love.
If you choose to curse
I will begin tearing assholes
into every conceivable part
of every conceivable member
of your family
and then I will begin the sex acts.
I’ll be a motherfucker,
a papafucker,
a grannyfucker,
nonifucker, pop-pop-fucker…
you name it,
I’ll fuck it.
I’ll cum on tits
and fart on nips
and diddle twats
swallow dicks
if I ever hear you use that sort of language again,
you hear me?
You hear me?
So tell me what you’ll do
from now on
and, for fuck’s sake,
mind your language.
I have been wanting to be a storyteller
since fourth grade
when Mrs. Takagi had first called Jonah Kaplan
the class poet.
Since that role was already taken,
I opted for the more general title of writer.
Perhaps I could have dared
to cage-match with Jonah
way back in PS 75,
once home of famed substitute teacher Gene Simmons,
but I didn’t dare
so it took me years to claim the name
of Jonathan Berger,
Poet.
I was meant to tell stories,
I have always thought,
but the stories have always seemed
hard to come by.
I am quite excellent
at avoiding danger
because I am not a fool
and do not leap in where they might.
Thus I have had
an exceedingly limited number of adventures.
I make up fanciful stories, of course,
with too many grains of truth
salted in for nutrition
but it is the lies
that hold the flavor
and my words are full of lies
and quite light in experience.
Perhaps the themes smack
of some sort universality.
Maybe I can, on occasion,
make something more honest than I mean to.
I hope that’s right.
Maybe there’s a cheat code to the world,
that explains my words
and everything else.
Maybe any poem heard on a day
that ends with the letter Y
amounts to “I am lonely”
and anything read
in a year that starts with a two
is about seeking the unobtainable.
Certainly, this one,
in trying to understand
the murk of my mind,
must fall in the latter category.
The noises upstairs
distract me from Beatles For Sale
on the stereo.
It has been eight days,
over a week since the neighbor passed
and her family has come
to sort through her stuff
and see what there is
worth taking.
I have met none of them,
seen no one at the hospital,
though been in phone contact,
heard tell of just having missed them.
I have never seen them visit grandma
in my two decades in this building,
heard no words of love said between them
– ever –
but they come now
to see her off
and see if her stuff
might find good homes.
Of course,
I was not with their grandmother
all the time
and I don’t know
of everything that’s gone on
in their family,
I hear them overhead
in my building,
her grandbabies, in black
(I imagine),
rifling through my neighbor’s belongings,
taking what they wish.
I knock on her door to greet them.
No reply.
They are busy sorting every little thing.
I don’t want to spoil their party,
so I go.
Their work follows the sun,
meeting Mr. Moonlight
and, unmet, unseen
they are gone.
The invasion is over
and the building and I
are left with memories of my neighbor
and whatever trash her relatives
chose to forsake.
I feel a little bit bitter
but a familiar voice buzzes,
“Honey, don’t.”
I smile,
and listen a little longer.
“Carl’s queries.”
Huh.
Hey, that sounds
like the idea for a real work of art.
Why don’t you get on that,
you little work-of-art-maker?
Just take the concept
I spent a second or two rubbing out
and put it into your art slot
and create something magnificent from it.
How long should it take you:
three minutes?
Five?
Tell me what you need,
but I’ve got an Uber waiting,
so if you could finish up faster,
that’d be great.
Look, I’m no artist,
sure,
but how hard could it be?
I heard once
that genius is ninety five percent inspiration,
three percent perspiration,
and three percent perspicacity.
So I’m helping you be a genius here.
Why are you being so ungrateful?
If you don’t like my idea,
I’ll just take it back
and work on Carl’s Queries in Querulous Climes
all on my own.
Jesus, some people…
For years I feared the smell,
that after too many days silence
I’d have to call
the police
or the fire folk
or emergency services
and have them break down the door
to see what had happened
to my neighbor.
I was worried about the awkwardness
of having to take care
of this non-relative
living just above me
until she wasted away
with no one to notice
but me.
I didn’t lose sleep over any of it
but a dis-ease crept over me
over the years,
a fear that travelled as far
a I did.
So it was quite a relief
that her last few weeks
were spent in a hospital
on Gun Hill Road
where professionals could care for her
and know what to do
when she finally stopped.
Hopefully,
there was no smell.
Hopefully,
no one will need to smell me.
This
is probably
a good thing.
I will have a chance
to think things over
to take a step back
to review my mistakes
and consider future opportunities.
This is going to be excellent.
I’ll finally be able to take a breath.
I’ll get to lose weight
read some books
study some ancient disciplines…
finally make something of myself.
Too long have I been tied up
in comfort
and an accident of routines
I never meant to endure.
Now, I can finally free myself
from all of it
!
The change’s gonna do me good.
I wasn’t ready to take it on
of my own volition
but now
with this future thrust upon me,
everything’s bound to get better.
Like the Fall of Constantinople
precursed the Renaissance
or World War II brought about the iPhone.
Even if you don’t want it
when you’re made to experience new things,
why not make the most of it?
He’s coming anyway.
Might as lay back
and enjoy the ride.
Drink fully from life’s cup,
says I.
The glass is half full,
I’ll bet,
and that yellow liquid?
It’s probably lemonade.
She told me to check the weather
and I said I can tell what to wear
just by looking outside.
She seemed doubtful.
I said trust me.
I know which way the wind blows.
Her look suggested something different.
Seeking to impress
I glanced out the window
spied blue skies
and explained that a spring jacket would be fine.
I told her she worried too much
and went on my way.
When I came back
three days later
after the roads had cleared
and electricity had been restored
I found she had long ago left
with no intent to return.
It seems
I had not been
quite so good with forecasts
as I had previously thought.
Dottie was really prejudiced.
She didn’t care for those kind of people
which is difficult
for a longtime resident of Fort Apache,
the Bronx.
Despite her bigotry
she found space in her heart
for the dozens of black and Latin,
Asian and Arabic locals
who passed by her block.
Each and every individual she met
might be part of a group
she would speak horribly about,
but those she befriended
were a credit to the many,
never representative of their group.
She knew infinite exceptional minorities
– exceptions all –
while still hating the various stereotypes
she insisted on subscribing to.
She was an expert
at those mental gymnastics,
justifying prejudices
while constantly defying them.
It must have been exhausting for her
but she made maintaining her hate
seem so very easy,
just one of the things
that made Dottie a credit to her kind.
How to tell the neighborhood?
All the people that passed
used to know her.
Who would want to know she’s gone?
She’s cremated.
She didn’t want a service.
She didn’t want anyone to know
but she can’t be so easily forgotten.
Why should anyone
be so easily forgotten?
Were she well,
she’d be on the street today,
telling all the passersby
that the crazy lady at eleven nineteen
had just passed.
They might not know her name
but they’d know who she meant
if she were well enough
to be on the street
to report the news
of her own passing.
In her absence
who is suited to serve her purpose?
Who has a mouth big enough
to shout of her demise?
I know none of my neighbors,
I don’t know who she knew.
Maybe a notice on the front door?
Some graffiti?
A live performance of some short attention span poetry
dedicated especially to Dottie Jonas?
A single candle?
A bonfire in one of our very many
empty lots?
What to do?
No one
should be so easily forgotten.
jonberger 