The Passing: George’s Room

Light streams through the cupola overhead, 

illuminating the dust motes floating 

on the morning breeze. On mornings past, 

George’s radio broadcasted the news 

from the BBC in London–halfway around 

the globe.  Today it sits, antenna telescoped 

into itself, on the small, wooden desk–

the desk scarred from its many former owners 

and rescued at a yard sale for a steal. 

*

Beside the silent radio sits an Underwood 

with an unlined paper half rolled through, 

words marching across and down the page, 

line by line, halting mid-sentence–a letter 

being written to a daughter living miles away… 

somewhere in the tropics.  A breeze wafts 

through the open, wrought-iron window 

and drags the faded Mexican print curtain 

across the typewriter keys and back over 

a white cane and straw hat hanging on a hook 

fixed in the rock wall.

*

A small dog–a Chihuahua mix–noses through 

the tear in the screen door, her nails clicking 

against the stone floor before she bounds onto 

the thread-bare, turquoise and orange armchair 

and then up onto the bed, nestling in 

amongst the pillows, sniffing the scent 

of her master before circling and curling 

into a tight ball and resting her chin 

on her tawny front paws. She stares across 

the room at the dresser, its top crammed 

with framed photos of children and lovers 

and friends in Ibiza and Kailua and Goa

and Dumfries, and here, in San Miguel 

de Allende–each person standing 

beside a tall, bearded man wearing 

a straw hat, his long grey hair drawn

into a ponytail falling down his back, 

his blue eyes fixed just off camera.

**

The Passing: Beyond the Courtyard

The afternoon breezes lift and tug 

at the tablecloths covering the the long 

wooden table flanking the courtyard.  

Pots and bowls and baskets claim 

each corner, while ceramic plates serve 

as makeshift covers, hiding the feast 

of chips and tortillas and salsa 

and rice and black beans.

*

Beyond the flagstones of the courtyard 

a riot of nasturtium blossoms–yellow, 

orange, and red–crowd a flowerbed 

and escape over the red brick edging onto 

the grass.  Across from the rebellious flowers, 

a water fountain spills into a mossy pool 

below, where carp wave back and forth 

beneath lily pads and lavender water hyacinths.

*

Beside the pond, sheltered in the shadow 

of a two-story stone house, a table stands, 

its pocked wooden surface covered 

in a multi-colored, striped wool blanket

bought in Guanajuato years ago from a man 

with a bent back.  A bowl filled with sand 

anchors spikes of joss sticks, sending 

tendrils of smoke skyward.

*

A vase of freshly-cut geraniums sits 

to the right of a collage of photographs 

featuring a man–the pictures capturing 

different stages of his life, from boyhood 

through manhood to old age–his hair greying 

and growing longer with each decade.

To the left of the collage, sits his kalimba, 

which he last played just two weeks ago 

at a summer solstice party, before the fall.  

On the ground, beside the table to the left, 

his wide-brimmed, straw hat, his shoes, 

battered and worn, and his walking cane, 

white and collapsible, wait for the traveler.  

*

A small dog lies beneath the table, 

her chin resting on one of the shoes. 

**

The Passing: What’s Left

Light radiates through the stained glass 

dragons dancing in the window, 

splashing a distortion of rainbow 

colors onto the four siblings holding hands, 

studying the artifacts scattered 

across the multi-colored blanket 

laid out on the polished cement floor.  

*

The boy steps forward and picks up

the transistor radio, tugging out the 

antenna, while holding the radio to his ear.  

He switches it on, suddenly filling 

the silence with the whisper of British 

voices, before he hushes the BBC with a 

click.  Then his sister kneels down and 

selects a ring–an oversized, rough 

amber stone clasped in a silver setting. 

*

Their sister pushes her glasses back 

onto the bridge of her nose and picks 

up one of the two kalimbas.  And then 

the oldest of the four siblings, the one 

with reddish hair–a hint of grey 

crowing through–picks the other one.  

*

The boy goes again, this time claiming 

the tape cassette player.  They continue 

to divide up their father’s artifacts, taking turns, 

youngest to oldest, sharing them as 

they had the ashes, until each has a small 

pile gathered on the floor at their feet. 

*

The oldest one stares down at 

the small dog lying beside the pile–

the straw hat, worn shoes, 

white cane and kalimba–wishing 

her sister had called her first, 

so she could have asked her to cut 

strands of his hair, and then they could 

have shared the silver threads also.  

© 2013

Reflecting on the Grist… the inspiration and the process

This poem began as a prose description assignment for a creative nonfiction course (an elective) as part of my MFA in Professional Screenwriting work. Colin Dickey was the professor and although the course was online and asynchronous, Colin did a good job providing insightful and encouraging feedback, creating a good connection with his students. 

I drew on experiences from my two trips to San Miguel de Allende in 2001.  Papa George, my birth father, hosted the family reunion in January, and it was the first time he and four of his children were together.  He passed away suddenly on August 15, and I returned in late August for three weeks to help with the decisions about his estate.  Although I contributed to writing the announcement about his passing and the celebration of life being planned, I was unable to attend his celebration, so the descriptions in “George’s Room” and “Beyond the Courtyard” sections rely on photographs and my imagination. “What’s Left” includes the actual details of how we honored him as we shared his artifacts.  I included Peachy, his dog, as a way to connect all three sections together, but also as a device to describe the scenes.  

Papa’s death was so traumatic for me that it took years before I could refer to him and include any reference of death.  To me, he’d simply “danced into the colored light,” remaining eternal and just a thought away.  

In Fall 2005, during my first semester of graduate studies, I produced a creative project Snapshots, which features photographs, artifacts, and vignettes about my January trip to San Miguel de Allende; copies of correspondence between Papa and me; and articles written about him after his passing.  Look for it on this site.