MyPoems

i don't like ouch poems, aaron said
when I showed him a raw, red litany of pain
and he went on to describe how bored he got
when someone fell and said ow, ow, ow,ow, ow
and how he much preferred someone to say ow
and then tell him about how they built on that
a poetic tale of post ow falling and then rising -
and i forgot that he ever expressed this to me
until years later i was asked about an email from him
in which he dubbed me the writer of an ouch poem
and my freind who was his friend wanted to know if
i had any other personal emails from aaron like that
and i told her how that correspondence was lost and
she sent it to me, and he spoke to me from the grave
and i heard his voice and i smelled his smoke as
he spoke to me with even keeled love and told me
six years after he died with a cigarette in his mouth
as his wife went to the kitchen to get him a glass of water
that he sees me as positively accomplished and that
it's time for me to progress to the chapter after ouch
and i think about this now, just after his poet son had a son
after having a daughter whom aaron eliyahu lives on inside
and how aaron's son's son is named for someone else
because aaron gave him permission to stop saying ouch