Prognostication
In my dreams, the dead are silent. I’ve never
had a good conversation with a single one of
them, just offer my apologies, bake the
bread, pour the coffee. What is the guilt
about? The dead no longer care about my
transgressions. Isn’t it enough that I hold
them here in my subconscious, treat them as
gently as I would a freshly-laid egg?
But this dream was different. We were going
to visit Kevin, who has been gone for over
seven years now. As in real life, I was
nervous: would I react properly to him? Would
he toss the verbal slings, so subtle and
cutting, if I didn’t pick up on something, if
I reacted too slowly? Or would he sit there,
blue eyes glowing, as my mother and I circled
him like butterflies, flitting here and there
in our attempts to placate?
Kevin spoke. He used the ethereal language of
dreams, of those who are now ashes and light,
but in that nasal New Jersey accent that I
haven’t been able to replicate in my mind for
years. And he was funny, so funny, because
Kevin was
bitingly funny.
I laughed and realized how much I missed him,
how much time had gone by and then I woke up,
not remembering a word of his complicated
meta-joke.
Time flies on and I die a little every day,
lose another connection, feel the pull of a
long-ago past. Yet my grandfather still shows
up at the old house. I smell his cigarettes,
breathe in sawdust, too-sweet coffee and
turpentine. He waits in his cell of a room, a
voiceless old man in a flannel robe, unshaven
and glassy eyed. I rush past the sink filled
with dirty dishes, walk a path of slate to
get to a mailbox that hasn't been opened in
years. Sometimes we take his car for a
complicated drive to Christiana. Maybe we are
heading to the hospital, waiting for someone
to hand me a small bundle, something I've
forgotten.
The dead appear without explanation or
warning. Carolin greets me in a too-bright
dorm basement, fixes me with intense eyes.
David Anderson sits in a classroom, shoeless,
staring at the algebra equation on the board.
Frank the cat meows for food that I don't
have. And my grandmother, the one I ache to
see, is sick of my inattention and has
stopped showing up at all.
Someday, no one will know that I was sixteen
and angry once. They will remember an old
woman deeply lined, forgetful, with
clouded-over eyes, demanding and harmless.
Inconsequential. As though I had been born
without desire, without the power to wound.
Image: Postcard, date
unknown.