The Day's Last Light Reddens the Leaves of the Copper Beech

by Dobyns, Stephen;

  saw no bears, only a keeper standing as stiff

  as a flagpole. Could he run to the trough, dump

  in the food and run back? Of course he could.

  But he was a thinker, that was the problem.

  He had a gift for spotting nasty scenarios.

  As in a movie, he could see the bear hurl itself

  from the ledge. That would be just the start.

  Way in the back a small black bear woke up.

  He was hungry. It was way past feeding time.

  The bear took a peek over the ledge. No food.

  He growled. Still no food. He reared up on his

  hind legs and roared like an Alaskan grizzly.

  Hadn’t the man known this would happen?

  He dropped the pail and ran to the bus stop.

  He even forgot to change out of his uniform.

  Close call, he told himself. It wasn’t exactly

  courage, but it was good enough. After all,

  he was alive. He began to tell people the story

  of how he had escaped from a bear. With each

  retelling the bear grew bigger, then it was

  two bears. He showed a scar on his arm from

  an old bike accident as a kid. This was where

  the bear clawed him. The man had no doubt

  he was telling the truth. In time, he developed

  an aura of quiet strength; he spoke modestly

  about being a hero. His kids looked up to him.

  His wife kissed his cheek. Does it matter what

  really took place? These reversals of bad luck

  that fate confers on the seemingly unworthy,

  they offer us hope and help us through

  the dark places; they let us greet the night.

  Statistical Norm

  He was amazed by the curve of his life. What he had thought unique had made its arc like any other, as if life had conspired to deny him his genius. His differences, finally, were very slight—like a man preferring chocolate to vanilla. His youth, education, career, his friendships, the ties to his family, even illnesses—there was nothing exceptional. And as he neared his end, he saw that here too he would yield to a statistical norm more offensive than death itself: a grave in a row of graves, his ashes mixed with the ashes of others. In his youth, he had written poetry, worn black, spoken of the avant-garde—no trace of that person remained. But he pictured him still walking the streets of some city, pursuing his passions. These days, as he puttered about, he liked to imagine the young man’s fabled successes: the women who sat at his feet, the men who stepped aside as he entered a room. Then all would look toward him as he prepared to speak. A hush would fall. And that was the problem, wasn’t it? For when he tried to call up his deepest thoughts, the rich complexity of his convictions, what could he have said?

  Turd

  The only time I hit a boy in the face surprised us both.

  He was flailing; I was flailing. We weren’t joking around.

  This was in fifth grade sixty years ago and I haven’t

  seen him since. Who knows how his life worked out?

  In those days being a writer was on the back burner,

  and being a jet pilot seemed a better choice, perhaps

  a private detective. Where I was and where I wanted

  to be were two islands separated by miles of water.

  I’d stand on my imagined shore and scratch my head;

  lots of time passed like that. So I hit him, poked a knuckle

  in his eye, and everything stopped. I’ve forgotten what

  the fight was about. This happened in the boy’s dorm

  at Clear Lake Camp—rows of bunk beds for fifty kids

  and all cheered us on. When I hit his eye, he yelped:

  He hit me! He wasn’t giving credit where credit was due.

  It was an accident. He was appalled; I was appalled.

  The boy began to weep and I began to weep as well.

  He was nobody I knew; he went to a different school.

  Boys from my school kept pounding me on the back;

  boys from his school led him away. And that was that.

  But this is just the start of the story. We were there

  for a fall weekend, and before lunch the men in charge

  gathered us together for an announcement. We knew

  something big was coming; we saw it in their faces:

  a mixture of moral horror and righteous indignation.

  This was in 1951 and six of the men were vets. D-Day,

  Okinawa, they’d seen it all. At first I thought the reason

  for the meeting was my fight that morning. I was sure

  the kid had told and I’d be called out. Instead we heard

  that some unknown boy had left an oversized turd

  in the middle of the shower room: twelve showers,

  a floor of pink tile and the turd, six inches long,

  squatting like a toad in the middle. I know this

  because the teachers paraded us through single-file.

  The word “turd” was never used, that’s my addition.

  Shit, crap, dump, poop, caca, ass goblin, black banana,

  hell’s candy, creamy butt nugget, keester cake, lawn

  sausage—none of this was said. The phrase of choice

  was that an unknown boy had crept into the shower

  and “moved his bowels,” as he might move an elephant.

  He had left his BM on the pink tiles. We were children.

  What we knew about the war was comic book stuff,

  so the product of one bad boy’s moved bowel viewed

  through the filter of adult displeasure seemed equal

  to Judas’ betrayal and the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

  The lecture was long and operatic. Nobody owned up.

  At last Mr. Sullivan placed a small desk and chair near

  the monstrosity, as outside the shower room fifty boys

  formed an anxious line. Each was to enter and sit down,

  as Mr. Sullivan, standing above him, shouted: Does that

  belong to you? I won’t get mad if you tell me the truth!

  Despite my innocence, I was sure my guilt would show.

  I was sure I’d giggle. I was sure I’d weep. I was sure

  I’d confess to punching a kid in the eye. But why stop

  with one turd, the mere tip of ten years of bad behavior?

  I’d spill out past sins like a fire hose spills out water.

  I’d tell him I stole dollar bills from my mother’s purse;

  I’d tell him I searched my father’s coat pockets for coins;

  I was full of dirty thoughts; I’d begun to masturbate;

  I’d killed a robin with a BB gun and buried the body

  in my little brother’s sandbox; I’d tried on my mother’s

  bra to see how it looked; I hid Hershey bars in my room;

  I didn’t believe in God, not one bit; I stole comic books

  from supermarkets; I didn’t return books to the library;

  I once broke a girl’s leg on the teeter-totter and ran away;

  I’d spent two hours looking up “whore” in the frigging

  dictionary not knowing it started with W. I was a bad boy.

  I was born a bad boy. I’d die a bad boy. I was marooned

  on the island of childhood like a degenerate sailor.

  My only chance was to plead guilty and beg for mercy.

  Mr. Sullivan asked his question. I couldn’t look at him.

  I shook my head. Then came a pause as long as January.

  Next! he called, and a million birds began to whistle glory.

  Nobody confessed. Buses took us back to East Lansing.

  For all I know, the turd’s still there. And shouldn’t it be?

  Shouldn’t there be a little turd shrine to bullied children

  and dumb ideas, to preadolescent confusion, to always

  being unce
rtain and mostly being scared, to all those

  kids who triple-lock the bathroom door and then check

  the window, afraid of doing something right, of doing

  something wrong, of getting caught, of getting away,

  afraid of wearing the wrong-colored socks, afraid their

  flies are unzipped, afraid they’ll fart in class, a fart

  like the tuba of John Philip Sousa, afraid of pee stains,

  of reeking arm pits, of sudden projectile vomiting—

  that’s the sort of shrine they need and if that antique

  turd is gone, I’d be happy to donate one of my own.

  Parable: Friendship

  Some tragedies are big; some very small.

  Here’s a parrot whose two feet were caught

  in an elevator door. Doesn’t this happen often?

  He was humming a tune or thinking about lunch,

  when his feet were snipped from his legs.

  He was a flightless New Zealand Owl Parrot

  named Buzzy, who was passed down over

  sixty years to Ralphie, his present owner.

  So how did he get by without feet? Buzzy

  learned to grip his perch with his little red

  parrot prick, allowing him to stay up late

  with Ralphie over a beer and good baseball chat

  before Ralphie left for work at midnight. But

  his wife hated Buzzy and his little red prick,

  and she didn’t like Ralphie much either. You know

  how these troubles begin. The wife took up

  with a ne’er-do-well for sexual relief, and after

  midnight the fellow snuck through the back door

  so he and the wife could smooch on the couch

  at least at the start. Then in the morning Buzzy

  would give Ralphie the latest report: how

  the lover and wife made the couch pulsate

  like an earthquake as they probed the depths

  of passion. But here’s the sad part of the story.

  One morning Ralphie found his friend with his head

  tucked under his wing. What’s up? said Ralphie.

  Buzzy didn’t speak. Tell me, said Ralphie. Nope,

  croaked Buzzy. This went on till Ralphie swore

  he’d lock his friend in a closet. Okay, said Buzzy,

  first they kissed. Go on, said Ralphie. Next he

  squeezed her breasts. It’s not true! cried Ralphie.

  It was a long story, better imagined than told.

  At last the parrot squawked, Then he tore off

  her lacy, pink thong. Keep going! cried Ralphie.

  I can’t, moaned Buzzy. Why not? said Ralphie.

  Because, said the parrot, I fell off my perch.

  Here the joke always stops. But who ever thinks

  of the parrot’s feelings? His job with Ralphie

  was his first work in sixty years and he’d failed.

  I did my best! cried Buzzy. But Ralphie no longer

  bothered about Buzzy and his little red prick,

  and he grabbed his hat and ran from the house.

  Could Buzzy comfort his friend? Not a chance.

  Consider how life can take a complete flip

  in two seconds. First we’ve got the heavens,

  then comes the abyss. Even if Ralphie forgave

  the parrot, they’d share no more beer and

  good baseball chat. He’d always see the hurt

  in Ralphie’s eye. The warmth would depart

  from his heart. The parrot would be ignored.

  Could he crawl to the street and be crushed

  by a bus? Quite unlikely. Say he leapt to the floor,

  what could he do? With just a little red prick

  to navigate, he’d flop about like a trout out of water.

  If this were the President, books would be written

  on the subject. But since it’s only a parrot why

  should it matter? Days passed as Buzzy gazed

  at the ceiling in confused thought: a brain full

  of zeros, a heart full of holes. In a nicer world

  Buzzy might get a tear or kindly pat on the back,

  but now he’s just a sob behind a closed door.

  Let’s face it. Who’s blameless, who’s blessed,

  who’s punished, who’s cursed—it’s a tossup.

  The Dark Uncertainty

  Often he tried to imagine the intimacy enjoyed by others, friendships of telepathic closeness, families bound lovingly like families in old movies—the parents caring, the children happy. And those groups of people picnicking in parks as he walked by on a path beneath the trees, or groups laughing together in restaurants—he pictured friends growing up together, being the support of one another through full lives, and then their funerals with long lines of automobiles traveling slowly with their lights on. He never thought these people might experience anxiety or doubt, that dark uncertainty could fill them with dread, that ambition or envy might lead them to compromise whatever ideals they had at the start. In fact, he never thought they might be like he was. Yet if he had, if he’d seen in others his own image, wouldn’t his isolation have been decreased? If fear hadn’t blurred his vision of the world, wouldn’t he have found that he too had a place within it?

  No Simple Thing

  Not having as yet learned how to live—

  indecision skittering like a dust devil

  across appetite’s parking lot—the time

  has come to learn how to die. First

  I’ll put away my clothes, return my books

  to their shelves; then I’ll raise the blinds,

  to see what’s happening on the street

  and which birds are forming their flocks,

  since I think it will be fall with the trees

  nearly bare, except for clusters of leaves

  clinging to the oaks. Does it matter that

  I’ve never learned to sleep on my back?

  Soon I’ll have plenty of time to practice.

  Like people standing in line waiting for a train,

  I’ll check my watch against a clock on the wall,

  touch the ticket tucked in my breast pocket.

  Don’t accuse me of morbidity. Actuarial tables

  have quickened their work against me. Oh,

  it’s no simple thing to practice for death

  and I’ve yet to reach the subject of goodbyes.

  Will I have time to speak to the people I love,

  to press a hand or stroke a cheek? Then each

  might need to make some remark, maybe even

  an ironic gesture, nothing too somber as could

  complicate a rational occasion. Better, I think,

  to slip out across the driveway to where a car

  is waiting, its motor making the softest hum.

  As often occurs the cat will escort me part way

  and I’ll bend to scratch his ears, as he stretches

  to let me scratch his neck as well. I don’t know

  what birds will be left, I don’t know if it will be

  sunny or dark. Pausing, I’ll pat my pockets to see

  if I’ve got my keys, and then smile at my mistake.

  No time now for whatever remains undone, no

  time for regrets or good thoughts, no time perhaps—

  and this is hard to imagine—even to shut my eyes.

  Yes, this practicing for death is no simple thing—

  look at how I open my hand and once or twice

  flick my wrist so a bit of fluff or loose thread

  stuck to my fingers can at last float away.

  PART FOUR

  Reversals

  Narrative

  A chunk of metal cubed and spat out

  by a car-crushing bailing press, a Ford,

  twenty years old, seemingly red, last

  driven by a teenaged girl who’d failed

  to check the oil, a gif
t from a doting

  grandmother with a terror of squashing

  squirrels recklessly crossing the road,

  who drove the car only to church, after

  buying the Ford at Ziggy’s, a used car lot,

  when repossessed from a single mom

  who had missed her payments till Ziggy

  got cross, a woman working at Wal-Mart

  whose former significant other left when

  he decided the Marines were his best option

  after all, but had picked up the car cheap

  from a couple who liked energetic sex

  in the backseat and were forced to sell

  when the baby came, the spot of conception

  marked by a stubborn stain on the fabric

  the shape of Texas, and the upshot being

  a daughter about to complete high school;

  a couple that had first bought the Ford

  from a soap salesman eager for something

  faster and jazzier; all but the salesman

  still engaged with the world, at times

  walking past one another on the street,

  or entering a diner, buying a few roses,

  or riding a bus, a group not quite

  a family, but who shared a memory

  of faulty brakes, stuck glove box,

  interior lights that rarely worked,

  seven people, including Ziggy,

  strangers intimately linked, except

  for the soap salesman, the first owner,

  an erratic driver, dead now ten years.

  Determination

  Cabbage—the first word put down

  with his new pen, a trophy pen,

  like a trophy wife, not cheap,