by Lois Chapin
a mobster, “Bomp,” was shot
in a phone booth down the street.
Since then the cabins have cleaned up their act,
and I don’t use drugs unless I’m shot-gunned,
in restraints, with a hood, and the gag ball is removed.
When the waves break under our porch,
everything shakes,
or maybe the Veuve just kicked in.
I’m not sure what hippie versions of Silver Oak
and Amaroni were,
but the crashing of waves, jolting the wood pylons
must’ve given them sea-quakes too.
The pier’s a sanctuary
leveling the field for grunts, students, and anarchists,
the have and have nots,
those wearing pukka shells, and flowers in their hair.
Now the gate is locked at sunset to fishermen,
joggers and lovers taking a stroll.
Out on the last cottage
at the end of the pier
a black and white seagull
eyes my nut-crusted baked brie.
Lies
Both our grandfathers were gangsters in LA.
We were born with blood on our hands.
The Packards and Tommy guns were lost
in estate sales before we were born.
Our granddaddies’ adrenalin fixes orphaned
both our moms in Harlow’s Rhesus lab.
Terrycloth maternal care, we both know how to pretend.
His wife died while inhaling and sipping at her addictions
during a Christmas party.
He says he wants to go quick like that.
I forgive his second Black Russian.
Aneurysm-fountain-of-youth smiles from the eight by ten
on the night stand next to the bed where I’m tied with red satin sashes.
I lie with a groan instead of a truthful sigh, when he pulls
the blindfold down, blocking out the photo of his fantasy death.
Later, sitting with my weight on the cheek with the least welts,
I ask about his A1C and HDL.
He lies and pours me more Silver Oak.
He asks if confessions on my couch paid the bills this week.
I lie and swirl the red nectar.
A crystal toast.
How sad that our bootleg-grandfathers were deprived of Napa wine.
Drum Beat
His river of grief
over becoming an orphan
in 3 months
carved out a canyon
of the loss
of the proximity
to his beautiful son
who moved to Tacoma
to be the creative director
for a gun company.
The orphaned father
picked up the drum set
packed it up
along with the music
and recording equipment
that his son left
in the bedroom.
Grief is a strange master.
She takes no hostages.
She slays every self-sufficient soul
strangling it with nostalgia
and a sharp knife of regret
all laid out
without a drum beat
in her wake.
Other People’s Neighbors
Other people’s neighbors
watch me arrive—
suitcase,
wine,
dog bed,
food bowls,
laptop,
books,
bicycle
and paddle gear.
The agoraphobic mother,
baby in arms,
screams
at their yelping Cocker Spaniel.
The boy, sequestered
in his garage,
shoots exploding soldiers,
while his grandmother hollers,
“turn off that porn,”
during our
Saturday afternoon delights.
Across the street
Sherwood Shutters
lives alone.
She’ll be 92 in June.
Watches
from her second story window;
salutation kisses,
the start and finish
of our bike rides,
leaving dressed for dinner,
me shedding ocean-soaked
Dri-Fit
and him
rinsing out the sand,
me pushing
the arthritic hips
of my Greyhound,
while my lover bribes
him into my car
with fresh smoked lamb
when I leave.
A couple times a year
she meets him
out by her mailbox.
Sorting through donation requests
from her church
with a tremor.
She looks up and says,
“Reminds me of my first husband.
He traveled.
Was like dating
when he came home.
You’re the most romantic couple.
You’re doing it right.”
Other people’s neighbors.
Leaving
I’ve lived in this house for twenty-two years.
This is longer than any home I’ve ever had.
This house has been my refuge.
It tried to make me feel like a good mother.
I’ve changed it to fit me.
I don’t know where to start.
I feel dizzy and confused.
All my things need to be given away or put into boxes.
All my family portraits are down for the open houses.
It’s already someone else’s house.
I don’t know where I’m going to live.
I open a box of pictures.
We’re still a family just thousands of miles apart.
I put a picture back out on the shelf.
I’ll take it back down later.
L’Chaim
L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read.
We’ve been walking our dogs to Starbucks for almost five years now.
Still L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read. Not that she wouldn’t love to teach me. It’s what she does. Invited me to join her adult bat mitzvah class. But L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read.
Today I’m between residences, not homeless exactly. She offered me sanctuary in her home. There’s pictures of those mourning the destruction of her sanctuary. L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read.
For ten days I’m alone with the dogs in the cantor’s home surrounded by icons and letters I don’t understand. L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read. Prayers and son’s bar mitzvah pictures decorate the walls.
I pick out L’Chaim, it’s the only Hebrew I can read.
It’s peaceful and beautiful here, sparkling pool, fruit trees and lovely gardens, all a toast to life.
L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read. But as the days go by and I sleep off the franticness of packing and house hunting, a soothing calm washes over me.
The piano, menorahs, stars of David, depictions of Jerusalem, guitars, prayer shawls and kippas, still, L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read.
I’ve only known the vivaciousness of crowded Passover tables here, engagement parties, and Chanukah celebrations. Now it’s silent, just me and the dogs. L’Chaim is the only Hebrew I can read.
But in the solitary contemplation of generous hospitality as I house sit
this clergy’s home, L’Chaim is a good thing to be able to read.
Dulcinea
The last time my local police department called me
in the middle of the night
I pulled on sweats and met
the patrol car
at a little park with basketball courts
and cement restrooms.
Restrooms my daughter,
who had been fourteen for only thirty-six hours,
had asked those boys
to stop and use.
She snuck out of the house
was driving around
and had to pee.
Those clean-cut Eddie Haskell types,
a mother’s bane.
These two Mormon boys,
their mission papers issued,
slurping up the last drops of Coca-Cola
from a Sonic cup.
I point with a steel finger
at my car.
The blonde Sonic cup sulks
to the once-cherished shot-gun seat.
That cop must’ve had a mother
of his own.
He let me climb in the back seat
of the blonde buzz-cuts’ car,
soon to be on blocks for two years,
and scream like a banshee
at the scared shitless Bible canvassers.
But now I don’t have any children at home.
I’m not used to thinking of this police station
as my police station.
My home still seems somewhere else
with towering eucalyptus trees and a frog
croaking for the sound track.
But here I am
in a miniature version of my home
with a tiny replica of my yard.
“You found her where?
Oh my god
she crossed 6 lanes
to get
over there!”
Now Ralphs trucks,
Metrolink trains
and horns aimed at texters
are my background track.
My cell phone plays some elevator music
through the tiny speaker.
I look out the sliding glass door
at familiar wicker furniture.
I pick at potting soil under
my nails.
The red cap
of a realtor’s pen
stares up at me from the tile
counter.
“Yes, yes, I’m ready,
what’s the address?
I’ll be there in five.”
At 6 AM I walk through the double glass doors
and stand staring at the overlapping hive
of bullet-proof Lexan.
A uniformed officer appears
from a long hallway
carrying a Styrofoam coffee cup.
“You Lois?”
The city insignia bears one word
rather than a two-word city name.
“Yes. Thank you.”
I’m amazed at how well we can hear
each other through the thick
layers of clear plastic.
Dulcinea,
sans leash,
wags her tail
and trots out
behind the officer.
The look on her face says
she very much enjoyed her ride
in the police car
and all the individual attention
from the night shift.
“Good thing animal control’s running late this morning.”
“Yeah, good thing.” I slip
a pull-collar over her head.
Five days into my new residence
I’m already
on a first name basis
with the police.
Woman’s
best
friend.
Shacking Up or Two Stacks
“So, will you talk to her?”
my boyfriend asks
again.
He reaches a hand toward mine.
I pull
away.
Sure,
why not.
We’ll form a club,
the subsequent girlfriends
of the past husbands
of the Hayword twins.
I’ll explain,
“Yeah most men want unencumbered sex,
but the past husbands
of the Hayword twins
can only stand intimacy
with a few zip codes
in between.
Closeness means getting to park in the driveway
and not on the street
like casual friends have to.”
I’ll advise her to invest
in a good overnight bag, because after a decade
of schlepping clothes and makeup
back and forth
I’m still not allowed
to keep any personal items
at his house.
Like he’s expecting his twin to come back
home any day.
I swirl my wine
and take a sip.
Some things get better with age.
At least her boyfriend will remember
the aging Hayword girl
who asked him for a divorce
last Thanksgiving.
That a woman can compete with.
The photo of her identical twin
on my boyfriend’s wall looks
like she did 22 years ago,
just before she died of a brain aneurism
at their Christmas party.
I have no advice for the brother-in-law’s new girlfriend.
Every other weekend I plop
my overnight bag down
beside the locked cedar chest
at the end of
his bed.
It holds her remaining
personal affects.
I went through it once.
Read her diaries,
tucked under the blue dress
and all her desk clutter from work.
Poor grammar.
She drank and smoked a lot,
through both pregnancies.
I doubt we would’ve hung out.
I don’t think he ever read
the diaries cover to cover.
He seems to believe
she was perfect.
The instant canonizing
of the dead,
for fuck sake!
At least the brother-in-law’s new girlfriend
has Facebook-proof
that the surviving Hayworth wasn’t keeping
her legs closed.
The twins’ birthday is February 3.
Super Bowl
is an excuse
for my widowed boyfriend
to throw
a frozen-in-time birthday party
every year.
The only football fans allowed to come
are the still-married neighbors from Modena Street
where they all lived
more than two decades
ago.
He told me that the marrieds
had to vote on my admission to the party.
He warned,
it had to be unanimous.
At first
it felt like joining a secret society
one with Roman numerals.
But over the years, between writing names
in squares,
I’ve taken first quarter
/>
and half-time polls.
After that
the crowd is too inebriated to conclude
any valid research results.
Each spouse gave me the same
quizzical look and said,
“Oh yeah, he’s the only one
that takes that stuff
seriously.”
So around Groundhog Day,
every year
I endure the repeat
high school reunion
of the dead twin.
I guess I could let the new girlfriend know
the Hayworth girls’ parties just appear
exclusive.
BYOB.
A lot of B!
I shake my head and ask,
“What does he want me to talk to her about?”
I can tell by his big blue-eyed stare
that he’s serious.
It’s not a, you’re-a-shrink kind
of will-you-talk to-someone.
It’s something else.
“They’ve decided to keep
separate households,” he says.
“He wants you to talk to her about how we
do it.”
How we do it.
Well we haven’t done it on top
of the cedar chest.
The rusted Ethan Allen pulls might not be strong
enough for restraints.
I blink
and pour more wine.
I didn’t remind him that just last week
he told me his oldest son,
the one who was 7
when his mom died,
saved up for a pet deposit
at his apartment.
But five months later
he still hasn’t gone back to the shelter
and adopted the tabby
he picked out.
He thinks his son may be afraid
to live with something
that might die
and leave him
again.
I’d call it projection,
but I’m off the clock.
This was the first Christmas Eve
he didn’t spend a week
cooking his six courses
with pilgrimaged ingredients
for the dead twin’s raggle-taggle
relatives.
The ones who hock garage sale finds
on eBay
for a living
and praise Jesus
while the twins’ brother feels up
his two teenage daughters
crawling all over him
between courses.
No, this year
the living twin left her husband
for a high school boyfriend
so, no one made the effort
to keep pretending.
My boyfriend and I celebrated
