Waiting in a Waiting Room

Conflagration, earthquake, fire—god, if there is a god, must be the god who grants small favors.

For how was I to know that someday I’d be bitten by a small hairless cat?

Perhaps I’ll go underground now, for fear I’ll become infected or shot by a firing squad. But first I’m offering my new poems to any publication with the word ‘new’ in their title—The New Yorker, The New Republic etc.—and will accept rejection with equanimity.

I’ve just written a letter to my late father: “dear Dad, it’s become inconceivable to me that there is such a thing as a Church, and that people actually go to Church, say prayers and sing hymns. It’s an inconceivable to me that people behave in such superstitious ways, with essentially mid-to late Mediterranean and continental European mannerisms, in the same way that fire and earthquake and other natural disaster are now so real.”

“Dad, might creation itself have been a nightmare? A weather event beyond our imaginations?”

Dad can’t answer, lucky Dad. I was going to ask Dad if I flunked writing in the 8th grade, just as I flunked math and then cheated by copying the answers while peeking at the correct answers I saw on my little friend Roy’s algebra quiz.

Meantime, I search for meaning: what is the difference between art and decoration? It’s merely a question of definition.