Читать книгу You Must Remember This - Michael Bazzett - Страница 13

Memory

It was not yet light.

I heard my father stir.

I crept downstairs

in my pajamas to listen

as he sent my brother

to find his spirit animal:

If it is a crow it is a crow,

and you will not go hungry.

I want it to be a bear

or a wolf, my brother said.

If it is a crow it is a crow,

murmured my father.

The door whuffed shut

and cold ascended the stair.

After a long moment

I walked into the kitchen

where my father sat.

I want to seek mine, I said.

Your what? he asked.

My spirit animal, I said.

He laughed and pointed

to the broom closet.

Check in there, he said.

Maybe the mop bucket

will be able to teach you

how to hold your water.

Very funny, I whispered.

My father shrugged,

What do you expect?

You’re a closet Slovakian,

and your brother is simple.

Last week at the library

he checked out the phonebook.

As my father spoke,

I heard the staccato

footfalls of my brother

and his curious gait.

The door burst open

with a gust of cold:

A bus! he said. Huge

as the sperm whale!

The mirror of my soul

is a crosstown bus!

My father smiled,

Good for you, Jeffrey!

His face was frank

as an open sail. Then

he looked at me and

mouthed these words:

The steam that blows the whistle

never turns the wheel.

Now that I am a man,

I can clearly recall

how snow sifted sideways

through the air, how

I never had a brother,

how my father yearned

to be elsewhere, how

I longed to board that

crosstown bus and sit

quiet in the weak light,

using a stubby pencil

to draw the curious

members of my new

family, smiling there

on those paper napkins.