And hidden symmetries
Falling once. Falling
twice. Tensing for the next fall.
For the next poem
Contriving calm I
shook off the cancer spell I
knew was also I.
Mixing memory
and a blank slate, another
lion-and-lamb March…
Two grandpas. Two ways
to shoulder a weighty stretch
of widowerhood:
embrace the role of
Grandpa-in-Residence or
tough it out solo…
In time even grief
goes: cherry trees drop pink snow
tulips lose their heads
And hung from toothpicks
a splayed avocado pit
begets a wet white
r
o
o
t
***
Gerald Jonas is a senior editor at WhoWhatWhy and a writer whose work has appeared in The New Yorker and The New York Times, as well as other journals large and small.
