You used to sing in dives
Down in the Village.

Me and Karline would sit at the
Bar and watch cocaine deals going on
Next to us while people clapped
Disconsolately during your sets.

Oh, you always had the voice;
It was the music that did you in
Although I always thought if
You had steered clear of autobiography
And actually put a melody together
With the lyrics you could have made it.

Ah, but, you were never sure that
Making it was your passion. In
The softer moments of your life
When we talked over lunch, you
Wondered out loud if a career
Was better or worse than a marriage.

You actually wore domesticity
Like an old comfortable dress;
And I remember how sad but glad
You were when your ex married
A girl who gave him children.
He deserved to be happy
Is the way you put it.

I was sad myself when you left
Although by then I knew it was
The best for both of us. Whatever life
You were bound for was never to be mine
And I had known obsession too well
To ignore the fact that loving you
Would have poisoned my soul.

We lost touch, and I am glad to report
I didn’t think of you that often or seek you out on
My Life. But Friday, when work offered
No other respite but the Internet, I looked
You up and found to my surprise how really
Far you’d gone.

Oh not in miles, but in re-invention
And though I am not prone to surprises
I must admit, to find you in a church
Was almost all my jaded heart could take.

And yet, and yet…The roads you followed,
And the ones you didn’t; The doubts you had
And those you didn’t. I am trying to see how they
Might have led you to such an end.

You found a man you loved divinely
Who loved you back. You gave birth
To two and settled in a New England
Village where the cacophony of your
Past would not trouble you again.
From there, taking phone calls
At a church three centuries old
And singing in its choir
Might not seem so strange a leap.

I have known people who have invested
Themselves in God, and to them I say God bless.
But for you to find Him, I must say
Is kind of strange because it is a fate
We’d both agree was improbable

What roads our destinies drive us down!
Maybe that’s the rub. It is not what we
Plan, but the journey itself, its twist and turns
That takes us there down unexpected trails

And that golden voice!
I am glad you found an outlet
For its continuation
So God, and a lucky
Congregation, can smile
Together every Sunday
It is given its rightful pulpit
And the world, your song.

08/08/2011

Author's Note: For M.B., who always sung for me and still does

Posted on 08/09/2011
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