Death of a Salesman

for my father

When that old gold-digger Cancer married him
she was only in it for what she could get.
She took him for everything he had, while I was
on the phone with my American dream--
one ballerina, one soccer player, minivan,
fireplace and wall-to-wall by a lap-edged lake.
My 'coholic husband worshipped at work,
and I bent the ear of the god of
the light blue sanctuary who inhabited
a place where they were nailing
another arm to the building's cross.

I was eating heavily then
but what was eating him was eating him,
gnawing holes until at last he lay: translucent lace.
When I lifted the veil from the bed
there was only a stain of pain and loneliness he
never meant for anyone to see.

We darted in and out from busy lives,
my sister, brothers, I.
"Love" was mentioned often, but it
was the kind that left him to his
nightmares.  In truth, I thought this only just,
for the way he had made my mother's life one
long bad dream before he finally poured
the bottles out for good.

Still, he carried us through childhoods with
stories in the dark, sang the stars for our rewards,
and taught us to whistle to the birds.
He planted apple trees and strawberries
and plotted with the sound of words for
the wonderful tyranny of laughter.

What really carried him those last long months
was morphine and the priest's promise
of a cup of wine in the best of company
some day soon.