De Giving Catur Thanks

-Aaron Blum

In the silence of the mornings with Puerto Rican
coffee on the stove, while the dreams
still linger dully, white carpet
between your toes, all the early conversations,
over lox and over bagels,
when you're waiting for the toaster,
by the bubbling water bottle.

While you're yet to be a son,
just the words between tongues
and a bridge, ephemeral, hanging there
all suspended and what should walk across
and what runs underneath
but the blood of generations,
of the daughters left of Israel
of the sons just right of Christ
of the prisoners of the mind
of the wisdom of the weather
all dried up and overflowing,

one being one being one being,

then the music of the strings coming fast
now from upstairs. And the laughter
as the years grow, shorter
as the kids grow, older
and the kids grow, older
as the parents start to work
and then there's change. There's always
can't stop moving
from plane to car to house to stage,
and who's performing? a slice
of deep dish personality pizza.

In the jibber jabber evenings
on the couch with bellies full,
playing songs about New Orleans
in a room packed to the brim.
With fire on the tongues
and the night is in the window
with the wind outside a-whisperin
something cold.

(Refrain)

You drive me crazy
and I'll drive you sane
and we'll both smoke cigarettes
out in the backyard with the deer
and the brown and golden leaves
and a Springsteen song playing
for the history is too long

to be passed down in the food
shoveled with the snow
raked with the leaves
spun on a record
sang by stevie wonder
played with a pawn
typed on a keyboard
dealt with the cards
bought and sold and lived in
told in a joke
cured like cancer
graduated from school
sued in court
talked into the air
given like kidneys
read in a book
eaten in chocolate
eaten in turkey
fought in a war
ran through the streets
died with a Rose
Sewn into suits
meditated on
blessed into spirits
prayed to death
missed for a year
and still stand like a temple
in the Midwest.