Posted by Atticus on August 2, 2004, at 23:07:38
Na, 1980
Glow-in-the-dark plastic Jesus
Extends His arms
In an unanswered embrace,
Clad
In a bathrobe
Or nightgown
Or something.
His flowing hair
Is capped by a halo
That makes Him look
As if He's balancing
A plate on his head,
Like those people
I saw on TV
In that Chinese circus,
Except their tricks
Were way better
Because they could
Hold whole chairs
With people sitting in them
On top of their noggins,
And I don't see any furniture
On the Messiah's coconut.He's perched atop
A little bowl
That's filled
With holy water,
And the whole thing
Is nailed to the wall
Above the headboard
Of my twin bed,
A glowing apparition
That still, even at the age of nine,
Sometimes drifts
Into the edge
Of my vision
As I'm nodding off to sleep
And makes me jump
In alarm.Across the room,
On my dresser,
Plastic Aurora model kits
Of the Frankenstein monster
And the Mummy,
Smudged with
My fingerprints
Set in glue,
Cast the same mellow
Green glow,
Transylvania versus Jerusalem.
I wonder
Who'd win
In a fight?
After all,
Each one of them
Rose from the dead.
No matter what happened,
They'd all just keep
Getting up
Again and again,
And the brawl
Would go on forever,
I guess.I look away
From the trio,
Rolling over to face
The bed where
My brother
Is sprawled
Upside down,
His covers tossed off,
His feet where his head should be,
His big pink rabbit, Irving,
Lying prone
On the floor,
And a waterfall
Of drool
Running down the side
Of his mattress
In slow motion.And then I hear
A low groan,
Moving with
Incredible stealth,
As if on tiptoe,
Slipping across
The hallway
And through
Our ever so slightly
Ajar
Bedroom door,
Before climbing quietly
And with great care
Into my right ear.
I turn to look
At the sliver
Of yellow light
Penetrating the darkness
Around me,
Cast by the frosted-glass dome,
Full of dead bugs silhouetted
By two 60-watt bulbs,
That hangs
From the cracked plaster ceiling
Between the entrance
To our room
And to Na's.I sit up in bed,
Dipping my right fingertips
Into the holy water
Just like Na taught me,
And say, "In the name of the Father"
(Touching my forehead)
"And of the Son"
(Touching my chest)
"And of the Holy"
(Touching my left shoulder)
"Spirit,"
(Touching my right shoulder)
"Amen."
(Clasping my hands together)
Na says to never get into
Or out of
Bed
Without doing this,
No matter how bad
You have
To go
To the bathroom.Sliding my feet
To the cold wood
Of the floor,
I carefully move
Across the hallway,
Stopping only to watch
The frantic, fluttering shadow
Of a moth
Who has become
A prisoner of the glass half-globe
And will soon join his friends
In bug heaven.I can hear Na's raspy breath
As I move into her room,
Carefully stepping around
That creaky spot,
Three floorboards in
From the doorjamb.
The old lamp
With the clay roses
Climbing up the base
Is still on,
Blazing through
A white shade
Made of cloth
That has lace half-circles
Hanging from the bottom.
They look like a combination
Of big snowflakes and spider-webs."Na," I say in a stage whisper, "Na,
Are you hurting again?"
She's facing the other way,
Lying on her back,
And I can't tell
If she's awake
Or not.
A contraption of metal tubes
Holds her bed sheets suspended
Like a tent
Above her legs and feet,
Because, Mom told me,
Even the weight
Of the fabric
Makes her skin sore."Na, do you want your pills?" I ask.
"I could get you some water." Kitchen water,
Which everyone knows
Tastes better than water
From the bathroom sink.
I don't know why.
It just does.
I pick up a bottle
And read the label,
But I don't know
The word on it: morphine.
Still no answer.
I'm about to leave
When her head
Suddenly snaps around
To face me,
Her gray eyes all milky
And sunk into her head,
Her stare confused,
But scary.I jump back
And let out
A little yelp.
She doesn't seem to see me,
Even though I'm right in front of her.
"Na, it's okay, it's okay, it's just me."
I feel like I'm pinned
To the ground
By her stare,
Like I'm that moth,
Caught,
With no way out.So I close my eyes,
Trying to remember
The old Na,
Before the cancer came.
Round, her skin still full,
Not empty like a wrinkled glove
That someone pulled the hand
Out of, leaving it collapsed.I pretend
It's afternoon and
It's raining outside,
But I don't care
Because the kettle's
On the boil,
And soon she
And her daughter, my Mom,
And I
Will all be sitting
Around the kitchen table,
Drinking tea.
(I've had tea
Since I was
Three years old.)
And they'll talk
Grown-up talk,
And the words
Will wash over me
Like warm bath water.Na has lived here with us
Since before I was born.
She used to live on Staten Island,
Back when my grand-dad
Worked in the paint factory.
But he died
Before I was born
And she came to stay
In our apartment,
And I'm glad.
It's been like having two moms
Instead of one.
Until now.She's always telling me
I was named
After my great-great-grandfather,
Who brought his wife, Maggie,
And six of their seven daughters
Across the ocean
From Ireland
When they all
Ran out of food.
Na was fat
Before the cancer came,
And laughed a lot.
She'd say that you could never
Have too much food,
And tell my mom
I was too skinny.
But now Na's way too skinny.
Why won't she
Eat her food?When I open my eyes again,
She's asleep,
That terrible stare gone,
So I sneak back to my bed,
And bless myself
With the holy water again.
Then I have an idea,
Plunging my fingers deep
Into the bowl
Until they're really wet,
And run back into her room
To put holy water
On her forehead.The next day
When my sister and I
Come up the sidewalk
To our building
After school,
An ambulance
Is parked
By the front stoop.
I peek inside,
And see Na,
Lying on a bed
With a tube running
From a plastic bag
Full of water or something
Into her arm.
The man in the ambulance
Shoos Julie and me away.
Mom's eyes are all red.
She says that Na has to go
See the doctors
In the hospital.That night,
The phone rings late,
I hear voices in the kitchen.
Mom gathers up me and Julie and Richard
And tells us Na died.
I begin to cry.
I think I'll cry for
A hundred years,
But suddenly
I'm waking up
And it's morning again.A few weeks later
I have the dream,
The same dream
I'll have over
And over.
I'm walking back
To the apartment
After school.
It's spring, and white linen
Curtains are blowing
From all the windows.
Na always said
It was to let
The bad winter air out.
But when I come into the kitchen,
There's Na.
I scream, "You're alive! You came back!"
I try to wrap my arms around the apron
She always wears.
There are hot peanut-butter cookies
On the table,
And the tomatoes
She grows in her window box
Are ripening in the sun
On the windowsill
Behind the sink.
She puts on a kettle,
And the world is perfect.But I always wake up
In the dark again
At that moment.
Glow-in-the-dark Jesus
Is still there,
Along with Frankenstein's monster
And the Mummy.
But the bowl for the holy water
Is empty.
It's been dry for years
Without Na
To refill it.
-- Atticus
poster:Atticus
thread:373420
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/write/20040729/msgs/373420.html