February 16, 2015Save the Human Race
Although she never did before, my mother lies.
She doesn’t have dementia. She answers questions
like someone drinking white wine at a dinner party,
pretending to have read the best-seller: Of course
I went to church! There was a skirt, she says, and
a dress—the same pattern? Red. I wore one of those.
The one we tried on Friday? I ask. A silence.
She takes a breath, relieved: Yes! The secret she
doesn’t have is safe. My father has been counseled
not to argue with her, or has his hearing aid off.
I think he’s going to say North Korea is planning
to nuke Hawaii, where my sister is on vacation, but
he’s into economic inequality and arthritis instead.
At least I don’t have to explain why I believe this is not
the worst time civilization has ever known, remind
him to take his pain-killers, cite the Civil War or
the Black Death. He’s in a good mood. He tells me
about the diversionary mission he never flew with
his Air Force unit, the medical discharge just in time.
I feign surprise; he’s shared this secret with my sister,
not me. So now we both know, I type into the email.
Dad wouldn’t have been one of the few survivors.
I think about not being anything at all, a missed beat,
a bright white screen with nothing on it. I hit send.
Outside, little brown and grey birds peck at the feeder.
A young hawk, mumbling his hunger, misses them
and takes off. And a jet in the cloudless sky is a silver
brooch on a white ribbon, up so high I can’t even hear it.
from #45 - Fall 2014