David Beebe

Nick


His dad gave us keys to the Oldsmobile in the field,
said to turn on the heater if we got cold. Earlier, Nick’s
grandmother took us swimming, a small lake surrounded by
pines, and we walked down the boat landing to the water,
barefoot in the dirt, and sunk our feet, shaking them clean
inside depth charges, minnows for submarines.

I asked if this was still camping and he shrugged,
dashboard green glow on his face. They didn’t have a tent anyway.

In the backseat I stared at the sagging ceiling where stars
should’ve been, pictured our church up the road, less
than a mile – the playground my dad had built, the view
from his office, the big stone at the bottom of the grassy
slope, the one I thought angels rolled from Christ’s tomb.
I wiped a circle in the window’s condensation and, across
the field in the dark, a TV flickered from a double-wide.

I woke Nick early morning, before first light when the hours
don’t exist, and showed him the raccoon fumbling an empty
soup can next to the car. Nick turned the key and rolled
the windows down, cold air pouring in. We rested our chins
on our arms. The headlights pointed out cows far into the field,
their emerald eyes glinting like dew in moonlight.

David Beebe

Dear Sister


Sometimes I drive past the blue house
with its ashen roof and white trim, note
the collected changes of a decade –
gone the bushes at the end of the cracked
driveway, gone the redbud popcorn bloom of spring.
There’s a small garden in the backyard
where the above ground pool used to bring
the family together, and the wide oak, sick
with canker and BB pellets, no longer leans
heavy into the porch, lending shade to those
unforgiving summer evenings.

I see you, bouncing room to room as if we
were too poor for doors, your hair electrocuted,
the bottom of my outstretched t-shirt scraping
the carpet. I see the home movies where you
played all the parts. I see our first dog, scarred
by coyotes – still her tail thumps the floor.

The old neighborhood is a horseshoe in
the wandering lens of a cold satellite,
a postcard with a watermark so fine
you don’t have to hold it to the light.

The door is locked, but all our ghosts still haunt inside.