fumbling vehemently

morning light coddled the mountain;

an old Indian patterned fleece blanket

wrapped his too frail shoulders-

at 87, December 29th...

that day he looked old,

more so than I’d ever seen

with nothin’ to him

but a cup of coffee

and a stare to the tree’s.

coughing in winter’s seed.

                I’d probably never know what he had on his mind

except a longing for more-

but less

all at the same time..

I mean, he was a simple man

complexities as such I’d couldn’t understand

lived on little.

a laptop, caffeine, scotch,

and words...oh

how he loved his words.

this is how I knew him to be-

was as he is

seriously solemn human.

his past hung between the wrinkles

deep within the pools of tired eyes.

waters where romance would’ve once swam,

a girl I imagined he chased away

(though he’d never directly say)

just brief rants, enough to let on, but not a clue as to more…

a cigar in the air, bedridden, and fumbling vehemently for his glass

“boy,

 love made us beautiful..

but boy, did love make us ugly.

like a woven reverie, or an unspoken memory.”

               

                I heard this phrase many times that winter

up there in his cabin beneath the aspens, and the

falling snow…the house that’d come to be his tomb

that last time I let him to his rest-

with his passing words,

hand on my shoulder, an unquiet mutter

“boy, love made us beautiful,

but boy…”

his eyelids fell for the last time that night

and under a bereft voice-I finished for him

“did love make us ugly…”