You move like a carnival,
pulling your stakes up at night
without any formal goodbye,
living from impulse to impulse,
town to town,
leaving us, your family of clowns
to clean the field of detritus.

You balanced the wire so long
till all you could do was fall,
missing our safety net,
crashing to sawdust on the ground.

Now we survey your apartment,
a catalog of dishevelment –
newspapers, magazines, overdue bills,
toys, cigarettes, old photographs,
books, cassettes, broken furniture –
the eviction notice lies on the coffee table,
unread.

Yes, this is where she died –
you could still point out the stain
on the carpet where it happened.
This is the spot where the warp
and the weave of your life came apart,
till you wished you were that very stain.

Your five-year-old is in tow –
the little boy who got into your house paint
and left little blue hand prints all over the wall
while you lay in a stupor in the other room.

Now the two of you head west,
crammed into a carful of worldly possessions,
heading for a horizon you keep grabbing at
but can never quite hold.
You pull your child along
into your wildness, your paranoia,
your pageant of despair.

But know this: we shall not sit
and watch him disappear
into that world,
leaving no imprint
but blue hands on a wall.
We will not wait
until your significance
is no more than a paper
blowing across an old carnival field.


[Author’s postscript: This story recently had a happy ending - or a happy turn, since it will likely be a continuing srory - when we were awarded custody of our nephew. This poem also won honorable mention in the Anthology Magazine 2001 Poetry Contest and has been published in their Jan.-Feb. 2002 issue.]

12/16/2001

Posted on 12/16/2001
Copyright © 2025 Bruce W Niedt