A Carlsbad Boxed Lunch
Remembering Bonnie Bucholz, née Lowe who for me, is still talking and swinging on Grandma’s front porch; and Sarah Vowell who went on considerably about boxed lunches seven hundred fifty feet under the rocks of Carlsbad Caverns.
Today the squirrel sits
in the chill April air
with its tail laid like
a shimmering fur coat
over a nervous body
backed into the trunk
squeaking, squeaking
as if some unseen branches
were being rubbed,
one on another,
by an erratic wind.
The flashing idyll is over
broken by a shadow
of a hawk, the call of
some internal hunger,
or the remembered source
of what is not quite there
to be remembered.
The bright shadows
of Spring absorb her
down the unphotographed
verso of the tree.
There was really little
to do at Grandma’s — except talk
— which the adults seemed
to do in the kitchen
with coffee — and little else.
There was…
—taking a bath in the tub with legs which had no legs
as the entire tub was encapsulated in a painted wooden box.
—laying on the dinning room floor with Grandma’s smelly dog
in front of the blasting vent shivering in the heat
of a thermal wind tunnel in front of the hallway passage
the bathroom on the left with bedrooms on the right
and the kitchen’s light & voices muted at the end of the hall.
—inspecting, with hope, each time what candy might be
in the leaded crystal bowl
which always sat on the living room coffee table
usual with the disappointing orange circus peanuts, untouched.
—having my finger nails painted by the girls;
then promptly removed by Uncle Vernon, no sissy!
—sitting on and sticking to the plastic covered
crinkling sectional couch; favoring the floor.
—eating Thanksgiving dinner around the formal
dinning room table with crystal and all—even for me.
—watching coffee being made in the glass double boiler,
and Grandpa with a constant cup;
pouring a little into his saucer to cool it all.
—playing sorrowful Sorry in the infrequently visited basement,
down the cool & dark back staircase, with Norman & Bruce;
littler than they, they beat me unmercifully at the game.
—holding all the pennies, nickels & dimes
from Grandma’s oft monitored red & black piggy bank;
funding which she gave me for the trip to California.
—swinging for hours & hours on the big wooden front porch
with the slippery bright yellow seat pad;
sometimes alone but often with a cousin or three;
the chains squeaked and squeaked in the cool air
high over the old neighborhood with small verdant lawns
and dappled sunlight filtered through the high green.
At Carlsbad…
Father drew attention to himself
(fat man’s distress loudly announced)
no different than anywhere else
he passed—and we all moved on.
The cave was cool and damp
without being wet to touch.
The ‘S’ words hung down
and rose up like post card
photos of what they were
in an indeterminate distance.
All the lights went off
and the guide
let us stand minutes
in utter darkness.
The deep black pools
must have reached
to the center
of the earth.
Memory can be
such a beautiful
and refining thing
that brings a perfect
arc to what might
have been —cleans
things up a bit,
makes home improvements,
removing the clutter
of multiple decades or so
like an independent
trash collector who will,
for a hundred, haul
your excess litter away.
It seems for all we
can remember (improved or not)
we are forever dependent
on “long-lost” cousin’s recollections
of children’s hours spent
swinging and talking
on Grandma’s front porch;
and Sarah Vowell’s obsession with
seven hundred fifty foot deep
Carlsbad boxed lunches;
to remind us--
that memory is selective
and collective--
a being that lives next to us,
but by its own rules;
and we have only
the opportunity,
from time to time,
to pick up strings of it
along the path.
East Lansing
April 25, 2007
Chicago Series
©2007 A Carlsbad Boxed Lunch — Joseph W. Yarbrough
Reproduction prohibited without written permission.
Remembering Bonnie Bucholz, née Lowe who for me, is still talking and swinging on Grandma’s front porch; and Sarah Vowell who went on considerably about boxed lunches seven hundred fifty feet under the rocks of Carlsbad Caverns.
Today the squirrel sits
in the chill April air
with its tail laid like
a shimmering fur coat
over a nervous body
backed into the trunk
squeaking, squeaking
as if some unseen branches
were being rubbed,
one on another,
by an erratic wind.
The flashing idyll is over
broken by a shadow
of a hawk, the call of
some internal hunger,
or the remembered source
of what is not quite there
to be remembered.
The bright shadows
of Spring absorb her
down the unphotographed
verso of the tree.
There was really little
to do at Grandma’s — except talk
— which the adults seemed
to do in the kitchen
with coffee — and little else.
There was…
—taking a bath in the tub with legs which had no legs
as the entire tub was encapsulated in a painted wooden box.
—laying on the dinning room floor with Grandma’s smelly dog
in front of the blasting vent shivering in the heat
of a thermal wind tunnel in front of the hallway passage
the bathroom on the left with bedrooms on the right
and the kitchen’s light & voices muted at the end of the hall.
—inspecting, with hope, each time what candy might be
in the leaded crystal bowl
which always sat on the living room coffee table
usual with the disappointing orange circus peanuts, untouched.
—having my finger nails painted by the girls;
then promptly removed by Uncle Vernon, no sissy!
—sitting on and sticking to the plastic covered
crinkling sectional couch; favoring the floor.
—eating Thanksgiving dinner around the formal
dinning room table with crystal and all—even for me.
—watching coffee being made in the glass double boiler,
and Grandpa with a constant cup;
pouring a little into his saucer to cool it all.
—playing sorrowful Sorry in the infrequently visited basement,
down the cool & dark back staircase, with Norman & Bruce;
littler than they, they beat me unmercifully at the game.
—holding all the pennies, nickels & dimes
from Grandma’s oft monitored red & black piggy bank;
funding which she gave me for the trip to California.
—swinging for hours & hours on the big wooden front porch
with the slippery bright yellow seat pad;
sometimes alone but often with a cousin or three;
the chains squeaked and squeaked in the cool air
high over the old neighborhood with small verdant lawns
and dappled sunlight filtered through the high green.
At Carlsbad…
Father drew attention to himself
(fat man’s distress loudly announced)
no different than anywhere else
he passed—and we all moved on.
The cave was cool and damp
without being wet to touch.
The ‘S’ words hung down
and rose up like post card
photos of what they were
in an indeterminate distance.
All the lights went off
and the guide
let us stand minutes
in utter darkness.
The deep black pools
must have reached
to the center
of the earth.
Memory can be
such a beautiful
and refining thing
that brings a perfect
arc to what might
have been —cleans
things up a bit,
makes home improvements,
removing the clutter
of multiple decades or so
like an independent
trash collector who will,
for a hundred, haul
your excess litter away.
It seems for all we
can remember (improved or not)
we are forever dependent
on “long-lost” cousin’s recollections
of children’s hours spent
swinging and talking
on Grandma’s front porch;
and Sarah Vowell’s obsession with
seven hundred fifty foot deep
Carlsbad boxed lunches;
to remind us--
that memory is selective
and collective--
a being that lives next to us,
but by its own rules;
and we have only
the opportunity,
from time to time,
to pick up strings of it
along the path.
East Lansing
April 25, 2007
Chicago Series
©2007 A Carlsbad Boxed Lunch — Joseph W. Yarbrough
Reproduction prohibited without written permission.