Poetry
by Sara Kaplan
Meeting
on a Path
The moon is hard to walk on,
and hard to talk on.
But there is air on this path
when she meets Neil Armstrong.
Earth's gravity
changes his look-not all bloated,
white, and bouncing. Armstrong
has somewhere to go, as does she.
But setting is important, who we meet
is important; it is Cincinnati, 1971.
She, a student, he a professor,
both walk on their paths-
he says hello, and she says hello.
You don't have to go to the moon
to see the world. Here, on this path
Armstrong takes another small step.
top
In
the Attic
I.
Once, my father had toys.
Once, Neil Armstrong stepped
on the moon, and left
footprints: the way one leapt
to the mailbox meant
anything was possible.
In the attic, I listen to news
of the moon-transcripts
taped on a machine-
"…mankind" over and over.
I rewind. The buttons,
difficult to press, like teeth,
like bones, hard to break.
I press play. Plastic tape
whistles as it winds,
rewinds to "mankind."
II.
No one's around
in the attic. I talk
to the machine like Neil A.
talked to the moon
about mankind. I'll talk
about everyone, in the attic,
stacked like logs, wet bark
dripping onto bark,
mixing into an armoire,
mankind like logs in
the attic, saved in boxes.
We find ourselves
hidden and say, "don't look!"
Then, we look. Look back.
I really need to want
to go back. My pictures
are my father's pictures-
our first birthday-
cake all over the face, ducks
on cards who "love you,"
who don't anymore.
The ducks are old
newsprint.
I want to see his pictures-
my father's brother
died of a cancer now
curable. Now, we can
get to the moon, too.
No big deal-
we will die. We will
fly to the moon?
Stop the tape.
III.
Someone will tell me
I'm "going to the moon"
as if I'm losing
my mind, the attic, space
where D-Day is kept,
yellowing in the Times,
my father's toys, which
he played with in the attic.
These attic things,
tossed dust.
I move dust and somehow
I've destroyed the attic-
did Neil A. destroy the moon?
The tape rolls, nothing moves-
put living purple flowers
down on a stone and they
will stay still, same color.
I open a box
that says "don't open":
papers from high school-
my father got a B-,
saved it to disintegrate
to moon dust. It all stays
still where I leave it:
say something to a grave
and get no response.
Say something to a tape
and let it record
what I know:
Once, my father had toy guns.
I sit and click them
in the attic. They still shoot.
In a black and white photo,
he shoots at the cameraman,
who shoots back. Once,
my father watched Neil A.
play with the moon dust.
Once my father had a brother-
not right now… I put everything
back where I found it.
IV.
Once I eat breakfast,
I let it go down-
there's no turning back
with Cheerios-it becomes
a meal for any time,
things can happen any time.
My father had a brother once.
My father played when
he wasn't a father.
When he was playing,
he was young.
When he was young and playing,
he had a brother.
He had a brother who played.
He had a brother
who stopped playing
because he had cancer.
Someone put the cancer
in the attic with the moon news,
the B-, the toy gun.
I will bring the cancer
out of the box. I will find it.
I stop the tape to play
in the kitchen.
Cheerios tool around
The Wall Street Journal,
hipper than the home
of the bowl,
until I snatch one
stealing the Features.
The Journal tells me
the Challenger exploded.
Did someone press
the wrong button?
I press rewind to "mankind."
I play with old transcripts
in the attic. I play
with my breakfast.
I will put the Challenger
with D-Day in the attic,
let the news ink absorb
into itself, let the dead
mingle, tell each other
what happened right
before it happened.
Right before "shit."
Last words. Remember
to say something. Tape it.
Forget this ever happened.
I put the Cheerios back
where I found them.
V.
What games do I play?
I rewind to "mankind"
in the attic. I play
with my breakfast
in the kitchen.
My father played.
I found his games
in the attic. My father
played games
with his brother.
They played toy guns.
Once my father had
a brother. I found
my father's brother
in the attic.
I'll tell you what I know:
I know my father whistled
and held onto his gun-holster
in all the photos in boxes
left loose like playing cards.
My father played. He pretended.
I know my father
had a brother. I found
his appointment book,
black, in the attic.
Every Saturday he went
to New York. Every Saturday
something happens
in New York. Do you remember
last Saturday?
My father's brother died
of cancer in the attic.
He played with toys.
He ate breakfast.
He found mankind
once he died.
The Challenger isn't
so bad once it turns yellow,
the bits of taped people
exploding, shifts
into pieces like shifting
boxes to find something else-
a toy gun, an appointment
for treatment of cancer,
for New York, for Saturdays,
when it seemed someone found
something to help save it all.
It's not so bad to turn yellow,
leap to the mailbox,
in front of neighbors,
shout-"mankind isn't so bad"
instead of-"hello." Whistle
to block the crash
of cancer, the flight
to New York, the whistle
of tape winding over
Neil A.'s speech.
Where were you when
the Challenger exploded?
Whistling down the block.
VI.
I hold my breath while
the machine records.
My face grows red.
I want to know what
it's like to be in the attic
with everything else
that stopped, except
when they're restarted,
as if I could keep
the cancer appointments
in the book. The ones
from forty years ago.
I'll go to NY and tell
the doctor, "It's Saturday.
Help me." He'll ask me
"for what? What happened?"
I want to tell myself
what happened.
With the gun?
No, that was for play.
My father played
while his brother died.
With the Challenger?
It didn't get all the way there.
I open my mouth, breathe,
press stop on the machine.
Everything else holds
its breath.
top
Currently, Sara is an English
Instructor at Del Mar College in Corpus Christi, Texas where
she teaches Creative Writing, Composition, and Literature. Her
work has appeared in LIT 9, The Cincinnati Review, Talking River
Review, The Meadow, the InLand, The Antioch Review, Harpur Palate,
Ruminate, The New Vilna Review, decomP magazine, & MO: Writings
from the River.
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