On The Other Side Of The Street

Even though

The display window

Has been stripped

Of its vestments,

The awning rolled

Back and rusted shut,

The shop is still here,

Right where I remember,

The door held open

By a dictionary

The size of a cinder block.

Inside, the black

And white linoleum

Is worn through

From the front door

To the bathroom.

The walls are covered

With outdated maps

And photographs, with

Framed jazz albums,

Sconces, letter boxes,

And a convex mirror

Left by the previous tenant.

Even further inside,

Past the dark cases

Filled with everything

Imagined, just past

The locked glass cases

And stacks of magazines,

There is a small room

In the back, furnished

With a smaller desk

And a lighted wall clock

With both hands missing.

There is a love song

I almost recognize

On the radio, a half-

Empty glass of water

On the windowsill.

And if I look

Long and hard enough

Though the dim light

I can even see that

Strange man behind

The desk who looks

An awful lot like me,

Feverishly scribbling

On a receipt or invoice,

I’m not sure which,

Only that when

He hands it to me it will read like this.

Bedtime Stories

Do you remember the one about the lost boys

Turned into trees? The princess betrothed

To a ghost by her miserly father?

The blindfolded lovers who fell into the sea?

It’s the scariest stories that comfort most.

Childhood foreshadows how it all will end,

But only after soliciting the dreams from sleep,

The sleep from the day a child stopped believing.

Orphaned at an early age from the world

Of privileged perfection, bruised by

The shadow of your mother’s raised fist,

You found the truth inherent in all good fiction:

Your mother was, of course, not your mother

At all, but a witch skilled in misery, her cackling

Voice commandeering the darkness, turning it

Into an apple, poisoned by jealousy... 

Only your father could have broken her spell,

But where was he? What kept him away so long?

And when would he return, his horse laden

With gifts from the Republic of Forgetfulness?

Tonight, in the bedroom down the hall from us,

Your son opens his book to a marked page,

Begins to read, only it’s you and I who

Fall asleep, together, just this side of ever after.