February 4, 1999
JambalayaWhat eight-year-old can recognize,
much less appreciate, the sublime sensation
of cold, perfectly-cooked rice mingled
with shrimp, chicken and spices
smuggled in from South Louisiana
in the back of a cajun work-farm truck?Pappaw always ate it cold, and he
took me into the kitchen early
one Saturday, before Mammaw or anybody
got up, made coffee, practiced
their usual summer house foraging
for breakfast, tackle or cartoons.He pulled the bowl brimming
with goodness from the refrigerator,
"This is how you eat it," fixed me a plate.
It exploded in my mouth, frigid textures,
fiery temper with a cleansing finish.
It expanded me, taught me mystery.He never understood me, and as I grew
into the antithesis of him we stretched
further apart, until his death
left me empty as that stainless steel
mixing bowl after the season
and the fish we never caught were gone,But what lingers is flavor, fire,
the secret hearts of men settling
down at a pre-dawn dinner table
sharing sheer Arcadian perfection
spoon by spoon, talking about nothing,
transcending Mississippi, Life and Age.
Fragments
Nothing matches up; maybe that's why
I'm sitting at home,
watching CNN,
trying not to react.
The news is all I want now,
reality in digestible slivers
I can have with juice
in the morning,
before stumbling into a day
where I have to think.But I'm always doomed to watch,
as if I'm always seven,
watching Dwight Stevens
chop a turtle to bits with an ax.
I thought about the blood
for weeks, flowing slowly,
freshness steaming out
through immediate air contact.The shell fragments
rocked back and forth,
no sides seeming to match
any other pieces,
to their own cadences,
impromptu cradles
for a rage that's grown,
or worse, been supressed,
since that day.
I wonder what he's doing now.No, I wonder what you're doing now,
as I talk to the machine
your new husband bought
to take my drunken midnight calls.
I wonder if feelings can sink
into the dirt like turtle blood,
if love goes stale so easily,
if the puzzle pieces you left
might make a picture.
At this point in the poem
Wolf Blitzer would come on
saying no, ladies and gentlemen,
this is no dramatization,
it's real. It's really happening,
and the world is still here.
There's been no reprieve.
You can't return to a channel
that's been blocked out of memory.
The news is all there is.No,
I won't leave another fragment
of an actual conversation
on your endless loop cassette;
your message is loud and clear.
You can't take my call right now,
but you'll get back to me
as soon as you can.
Floating (for Diana)
We both know the broken line
between friendship and eternal devotion
has plenty of spaces to peek through,
the way you look at other men
when you think I'm not looking;
then again, you never know I look,swimsuit curving high on a thigh
as you climb a rock to sit,
watch the river flowing past,
me balanced on the surface
watching you backlit by the sun.Floating like this, hearing you laugh
takes me back to parties,
together in your kitchen, both of us
a little drunk on vodka
and blood-red Cranapple,
holding each other, your hand
under my shirt, rubbing my chest,
covert smile brief
as the rumor of a kiss.I don't know how many years
I've watched, but the peach
of your skin is so familiar,
a color that never changes
no matter how long you stay
in the sun, while I burn.You smile down at me,
and I realize I stopped
interpreting that smile so long ago,
judging word and touch,
fearful of drowning in love
I've always only watched,
it's better just to float.
Better Living Through Chemicals
Prevacid, Accupril, Zoloft and rain-
my daily dose plus an omen of skies
as black as the inside of my smoker's lungs,
deep as an acid-pitted stomach,
as unforgiving as the pain assaulting
the senses, the mind and body
without a handful of capsules.Pharmaceutical companies live for me,
the habitual user conditioned by doctors
and a body failing with each step
closer to death, clutching his plastic
childproof bottles to his chest in a show
of dependence and sympathy.
Is it better just to let the shingles fall?After all, this body's just a roof sheltering
a mind from the rain and gale winds
tearing at it from every corner of the world,
holding a soul at bay so it won't float
out into the whole of existence and lose itself;
it must be grounded, as must I by dosing
schedules and regular refills at the pharmacy.At times I long for Wordsworth's solution,
retiring to a darkening forest with pen and paper
and a body free of artificial remedies,
pouring the soul that won't be freed
onto page after lingering page to forestall
the heartburn, blood pressure, depression
that attach to me like symbiotes.Maybe a handful of acorns, clouds shaped
like bluish-white, perfect capsules opening
to take me in, swaddle me in cooling mist
until my shell cracks, falls away, useless
as another drop of forgotten rain.
An animal again, my only concern survival
and moving from one place to the next.
Copyright © Jeff Kersh
All rights reserved.Jeff Kersh is a technical writer living near St. Louis. He has earned a PhD degree in Creative Writing from Oklahoma State University, and has previously published poems in The Lucid Stone, Heartbeat and the Eleventh Muse, among other "littles."
Be sure to check out Jeff's short story - "Cold, Hard" - also featured on reality x.
