this is me ...
this is me
waving goodbye
see me there?
over there by that
row of corn stalks
on my uncle's farm?
maybe you don't
since that was some
fifty years ago
when the family got together
and we cracked corn
from husks
and threw it in a
giant pot of boiling water
and Sherry burnt her hand
trying to scoop one out
for me
and when i offered
to kiss her fingers better
her father laughed
and mine said "NO"
in a voice
even more giant
than that pot
because someone
had said
someone had told
so there it was
the "Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum"
of condemnation
and all i could think was
"bastard"
this is me
saying goodbye
you may find it hard
to hear me
because i've been smoking some
fifty years now
and my voice is
a little ragged
these days
well i see the word
form in my mind
and i send it down the chute
but it just doesn't
connect with my tongue
at least not the way it should
gets a little muffled
takes a swan dive
but ends up like a
belly-flop
still it's there
if you want it
not a big deal
just two simple syllables
goodbye
did you hear it that time?
this is me
thinking goodbye
and isn't that the worst of all
not a wave or a word
but a thought
and so much more powerful
in its finality
as i step through
the red front door
pause by the matching
red petunias
that smell a little
like death
if you linger
by the white brick planter
long enough
no one bargained for this
no one really believed
i would leave
but there i go
down the stone walkway
out to the road where
the Rudnick's dog
got squashed by a car
its eyeballs popping out of its head
one hot summer's day
and maybe that's what happens
to those who go
where they should not go
but it's on down the road
down the long dusty road
walking away from
all those years
all the crippling years
and hurrying with some certainty
because going is everything now
and home is such
a long ways
away
such a bloody long ways
away
waving goodbye
see me there?
over there by that
row of corn stalks
on my uncle's farm?
maybe you don't
since that was some
fifty years ago
when the family got together
and we cracked corn
from husks
and threw it in a
giant pot of boiling water
and Sherry burnt her hand
trying to scoop one out
for me
and when i offered
to kiss her fingers better
her father laughed
and mine said "NO"
in a voice
even more giant
than that pot
because someone
had said
someone had told
so there it was
the "Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum"
of condemnation
and all i could think was
"bastard"
this is me
saying goodbye
you may find it hard
to hear me
because i've been smoking some
fifty years now
and my voice is
a little ragged
these days
well i see the word
form in my mind
and i send it down the chute
but it just doesn't
connect with my tongue
at least not the way it should
gets a little muffled
takes a swan dive
but ends up like a
belly-flop
still it's there
if you want it
not a big deal
just two simple syllables
goodbye
did you hear it that time?
this is me
thinking goodbye
and isn't that the worst of all
not a wave or a word
but a thought
and so much more powerful
in its finality
as i step through
the red front door
pause by the matching
red petunias
that smell a little
like death
if you linger
by the white brick planter
long enough
no one bargained for this
no one really believed
i would leave
but there i go
down the stone walkway
out to the road where
the Rudnick's dog
got squashed by a car
its eyeballs popping out of its head
one hot summer's day
and maybe that's what happens
to those who go
where they should not go
but it's on down the road
down the long dusty road
walking away from
all those years
all the crippling years
and hurrying with some certainty
because going is everything now
and home is such
a long ways
away
such a bloody long ways
away
© Kennedy James. All rights reserved.
I find those times in the past that I've said goodbye and meant it, I said it only once.
ReplyDelete(BTW, that picture up there looks like KJ van Damme, KJ Stallone, or KJ Schwarzenegger, carrying an M-60, while in the computerized laser sites of the Terminator after sunset.)
~Manfred
Yes, I've been working out ... haha ...
DeleteI am almost always like Sisyphe, i am trying to push the boulder of the past up the present, but... it has ended and it rolls down again... goodbye is the hardest word in my vocabulary. I think that in most cases there is a chance...but when finally comes a time to say goodbye to something or someone, I do it with all my mind and with all my emotions and feelings. And that is the end. I dont live with the thought that I'm an ex, an ex lover, an ex friend and ex colleague and ex excellent, I am what i am in the moment and can be whatever i decide to be...
ReplyDeleteReading your poem a strange image non stop leaps out of my mind. A hamster in a wheel. An end without end. Spinning round blur your eyes and you lose the meaning of things. I just wanted to scream "stop, get down and stay in place, at least in this way you will know where you are... I felt the hurrying, the wish to disappear, the finality of all... i don't like goodbyes, i don't ever want to hear you tell me goodbye... it hurts
ReplyDeleteSometimes goodbyes are good things ... and almost always inevitable ...
DeleteSo it goes ...
I'm coming back for another read, KJ. The depth of this poem is a bit overwhelming (for me).
ReplyDeleteNot really so deep ... just a departure ...
DeleteDoes this mean you're leaving us--on social networking--KJ?
ReplyDelete~Manfred
Oh no ... still too much "stuff" in my head ... ;o}
DeleteIt would seem that, for every good-bye, there is a hello ...
ReplyDelete