TWO SONS

WHEN JOHNNY WEISMULLER DIED, TAKING HIS TARZAN YELL TO THE GREAT BEYOND, MY SON, DAVID, WAS BORN (1984)

  

They cut the cord and you didn’t fly

Like a deflating balloon because you were anchored,

First in your exhausted mother’s arms

For a welcome kiss and a baptismal teardrop,

Then to me, David, (“beloved’), for my moments,

My turn to gaze and smile and weep

At a beautiful, scrunched-up face, at flickering eyes,

At the tiny sounds of breathing, at new you.

They wrapped you like a tortilla, full of goodness,

Delicious and more than good enough to eat,

And a mariachi band played a Tex-Mex jig

Before fireworks spelled out “HELLO”.

At least that’s what I heard and saw

Under that strange hypnosis.

Ahhhhhhh...yee…ahh…ee...ah…yee…ah...ee...ahhhhhhhhh... 

WHEN TOM CRUISE WAS TAKING OUR BREATH AWAY AS MAVERICK IN TOP GUN, MY SON, STEVEN, WAS BORN (1986)

You don’t have to say it.

You just have to see it

To get it, to understand it,

To absorb it – joy.

You don’t have to hear it.

You just have to sense it,

To tap the rhythm,

To feel it – heartbeat.

Once you were black, white and grey fuzz

In a hospital snapshot, a shape, a puzzle,

Upside down, up to the light, a jigsaw piece

In a bigger picture, your picture, signed by you

With a wiggly trace of your miniature fingers.

We all gained.

Your brother, David, had a new wingman.