alisa golden
SWITCHBACKS
I hit my stride, I’m walking café high, past straight chairs, past fried eggs, passing the time on the sidewalk: it’s mine. I see a woman I decide I don’t like, all made up, looking forty, eyes are seventy, but I don’t catch them, I catch her words, “He died at eighteen, last June.”
She starts to stand, and I think about a grandson or a nephew, about squashed metal, broken glass, or dangling rope, and I’m sorry, so sorry I judged her, misjudged her. She must be sad. And she stands from the table, pushes in her metal chair that scrapes the sidewalk, and says to her friends, a white-haired man and a nicely-combed woman, “But this new guy, this Jack Russell…”
Then my thoughts drain away and I get new blood coming in, thinking about all those blue Times bags I’ve jammed in the closet to recycle some day. But it’s all jive. I’ve been stung and fallen down the hole again where the ambulance doors slam shut and shut, and they take a boy away forever. I keep walking, I don’t turn my head, but my heart twists back, glad she’s got a replacement, this new dog, could be named Jack Russell for all I know. Jack Daniels for all I care.
At home I don’t bother with whiskey. Never have.
I go straight for the bitter stuff, the replacement. The darkest
chocolate you can
ever. really. eat.
I hit my stride, I’m walking café high, past straight chairs, past fried eggs, passing the time on the sidewalk: it’s mine. I see a woman I decide I don’t like, all made up, looking forty, eyes are seventy, but I don’t catch them, I catch her words, “He died at eighteen, last June.”
She starts to stand, and I think about a grandson or a nephew, about squashed metal, broken glass, or dangling rope, and I’m sorry, so sorry I judged her, misjudged her. She must be sad. And she stands from the table, pushes in her metal chair that scrapes the sidewalk, and says to her friends, a white-haired man and a nicely-combed woman, “But this new guy, this Jack Russell…”
Then my thoughts drain away and I get new blood coming in, thinking about all those blue Times bags I’ve jammed in the closet to recycle some day. But it’s all jive. I’ve been stung and fallen down the hole again where the ambulance doors slam shut and shut, and they take a boy away forever. I keep walking, I don’t turn my head, but my heart twists back, glad she’s got a replacement, this new dog, could be named Jack Russell for all I know. Jack Daniels for all I care.
At home I don’t bother with whiskey. Never have.
I go straight for the bitter stuff, the replacement. The darkest
chocolate you can
ever. really. eat.
~
Lyric Essay Award Honorable Mention
