STICKY-NOTES

for your brain
comes preinstalled
from the manufacture
at no extra cost
to you; some work
and some do not--
as to why
we don't know.
They're boxed
& layered
with general divisions
& sub-divisions
like: Family,
Lovers, Sex, Food,
Pleasures, Pain,
Betrayals and
Not Yet Named and some
are left blank
with possibility.

Today, it was cancer
& The Babe & his daughter's death
at the age of 102.
I never had cancer,
never knew The Babe
and didn't know his daughter,
but I did have diabetes
and thought a lot about,
and gravitated toward,
dying & death at 11
seemingly going forward.
The Times had Julia's demise
noted & all I had to do
was click on it & there I was
at 12 remembering
The Babe not able to eat
the white of a hard-boiled egg
without blood
gushing from his gums
& pain indenting his body
into a jolting question mark.
My note had many
traumatic question marks:
how was I going to die?
how messy would it be?
who would be there
to hold my hand
and get me
from this place
to the next?
I was able to see
the starched white nurses'
starched white uniforms,
smell the disinfectant,
taste the bile
of fear, and fear
each minute yet to come.

I read his bio
61 years ago,
but it stuck
somewhere
in the stack
under Health
maybe Dying
maybe both.

Breathing
after the first breath
is dangerous.
It should come
with instructions
or warnings--
but then again,
no. they shouldn't--
it's a crap shoot--
let's leave it
at that.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2019

WHO HAS IT BETTER

than Jeter?
we'd ask
each other
from '95
through '02
and smile
at each other
because no athlete
had it better
through those
championship years
here in NYC.
We watched as he took two
& hit to right, run-out
every contact, steal, squeeze,
dance & pirouette at short,
turn two with the old man, Luis,
homer when he had to,
and take one
for the team
when
there was no other way.
Skills, looks, acclaim
& the money that only The Yankees
can lavish on a player and only
this crazy city can supply.
It gave us some fun
in an otherwise
unforgiving
life; the only reason
these gods
get paid
like gods.

We'd not spoken
for nearly ten years
until tonight,
his last night,
at "The Stadium,"
the summer cathedral
of myths,
and she called
& posed
the same
question:
who has it better?

I've regretted
many things
in my life
but knowing her
was never one of them
and it was good to hear
she feels the same
about me.
It was worth the wait.

The rest of what we talked about
is really
none of your business.
Isn't it better
that way?

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014