THE TICK OF TOCK

cannot be
reclaimed.
It vanishes
& shape shifts
into an easy
old shoe
dance
of lies.

I loved
that woman.
But can't
be sure
who
that woman
is
now.
Or
who she was
then.

Only
a refrain
returns.
Who wrote it
or sung it
I can't be sure.

Years
have turned
while the wind
scratches
its dead
from branches.

Soon it will be dry.
And then moist.
A jack-o-lantern smile
will beckon.
And then jingles.
And I'll be me
and you, you.
What could be
never was.
Perfectly
empty, allowing
a metronome
of sorrow
to play
over
& over
& over
again.


Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2015

BARNEY

was a gentle man
& a gentle soul.
He was my father's father
and lived to ninety-seven
dying in his sleep
unlike his wife, thirty years
his junior, who died
in her late sixties
fat & cancer ridden,
angry & manipulative
until her last breath.

He taught me to whittle
& play Pinochle, as I watched
him smoke Camels, sip whiskey
& shadow box to the fights on TV.
It was whispered
that he didn't care
who his wife was fucking--
as long as it was not him.

I've been in
a sentimental mood of late,
as if Ellington & Coltrane
looped around my brain
continuously. Maybe
it means
the end
of things
or maybe
another turn?
I don't care
to reason
with that;
I only care
to travel.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2015