(4) From: The Wait, BL Seiber, 1994 (The Prize)

Please read 1, 2, 3, 4 in numeric order


The Legend
She waits for the manna of your letters from prison, the love seat by the window worn to her contour. But that's what you want: someone to believe the legend you created enough to hold vigil. In rundown neighborhood taverns where you were most comfortable, grown boys swear they drank with you that night before. The newspapers headlined the murder; your photo, face dead cold, eyes crazed. The only time she broke down was when I told her I didn't care if I never saw you again. Today, I packed three crates of letters, what you call poems, proclaiming the glory of God, the forgiveness of Jesus. Still, there's hardly room for her clothes in the dresser. Both it and the nightstand are full of white envelopes postmarked Louisville addressed to our mother. You somehow think they're important, need to be saved. The document signed by the governor commuting your death sentence slipped into the large illustrated bible you sent home from Vietnam, as if it were some diploma. Ministers call to say they're praying for you. That's fine. I spend hours filling boxes, avoiding the subject.


Letters for the Dark
August will subside in the pale glow of moonflowers. The first opened this evening around eight-thirty while I was occupied with a sketch I won today at auction. A charcole nude of a reclining, slight-built teen, his head turnd away from the artist. I imagine that you, my wildhaired buck-dancing boy. The slim build, little more than a faint triangle nesting small, perfectly formed genitals. All reminiscent of the image of you I keep bound in my head. The face, buried in a pillow, adds to the intrigue, and more readily allows for the fleshing of memory; so like the pornography you left by my bed. The moonflower is new to my garden. A full hand across, the soft white saucer protrudes from a throat extending fantastically from the fence trellis. I would imagine it lonely but for the other buds swirling to unfold with the next night's darkness. Calonyction: A fairness of night; fitting tribute to the motions of loss. One night per blossom.


The Poem I Fail at Writing
Snow filled the path we made through the dark as I opened the drapes to let in the shimmer. You didn't like candles, said something about whores. And I couldn't share this secret with vulger bright light. The world slipped as you made your play. The shirt falls through heaven with deliberate slowness; jeans take a decade to light by the chair. The fierceness of youth. The naieve posing. And after the trembling I whispered "Be my Goldmund," remembering my Hesse. "And I'll be your Narcissus." I thought you asleep. You never answered. Then with my "God I love you," all hell broke lose.


Pleasant Cem try, Era, Ohio
A e is missing from the cemetery gate the otherside of Era, off state Route 3. The scrolling, wrought iron arch reads Pleasant Cemet ry--I know that's not true. A boy is buried there. I come occassionally to stand at his grave, measure my anger against rolling clouds. I think of his mother, if she's any better. I would like to see finches darting between stones, some quick flash of life. Sentinel pines are too dark: morbid. The old mausoleum crumbling to shame. He had said, as we walked cobbled streets of our gay district, "If I ever test positive, I'll kill myself." The sod is quite thick this year. I guess it'll hold. I come to replace what his mother tears out. She's mourning grandchildren, a lack of bright flowers. No son of hers would ever end up... The clouds roll out across the plain.


The Prize
In the garden with twine and Father's bone-handled Case XX, undoing storm damage; tall young tomatoes have fallen from stakes, vines lay haphazard, groundward, confused. Crouching in wet grass, I gather each branch, rebundle the green mass of leaves, fruit and stem. I'm careful to not lay the knife down between steps. The moisture would ruin the blade's patina. The knife was my gift to him, years ago Christmas, one of many I gave him, returned at his death. Twice doubled, the twine cuts easily, no match for the sharpness of forge hardened steel. He understood a boy's need for a knife, the truth of machined blades, bleached-bone and stag-handled. The first that I owned was one I'd stolen from a third grade class closet, with multiple blades too large for a boy. He asked where I got it. I lied, "From a buddy at school." Sin number two. My father pocketed the big knife, multiple sin, gave me a small, worn, single blade Case. "Don't take it to school and get caught," he said. "That's how knives are lost." How did he know? Here in the garden, hands greened, knees muddied, I lash vines to slim poles, lay claim through these labors, his garden and yard.