Long Division
by Bryan Borland
My friends are divided
into two camps:
those who’ve lost a parent
and those who will lose a parent.
Those who’ve lost a mother or father
talk in the tired voices of old soldiers;
there is kinship. We could be drinking coffee
together on Veteran’s Day. We could be old men.
Then there are the concentration camps. My Jewish,
Christian, Atheist friends who
look at the clock, who watch me walk
into carbon-monoxide showers and return
having seen what they are not ready
to see themselves.
The coffeeshop tables
are getting crowded.
The concentration camps
will soon be ghost towns.
We are getting older, friends.
I am sorry for us all.
© Bryan Borland
* From the forthcoming collection Less Fortunate Pirates: Poems from the First Year Without My Father
This is a very moving expression of that life-passage of losing a parent. When my mother died, it brought me and my father closer in the years before he died, eight years later. A superb poem.
Philip, thanks for visiting and commenting. I think that overall, this collection will speak in universal terms of loss, whether that loss either parent, a brother or sister, another relative, or a friend. It’s a diary of human emotion in response to grief and the way we process it. Other poems in the collection will feature the renewed relationship I have with my mother, my surviving parent. The steps we walk are the same, no matter who we are. Here’s to YOUR mother.
first – i love your new header…
simple and strong
a moving poem, i love the way it develops and that strong start which throws me straight into your mind.
your new title sounds so great that if you would sell stocks for it i would be buying one now…
Dhyan! The first to comment on the new header! But you don’t miss the naked photos of Levi? Haha. And I’m not sure you want to be in my head, but you are welcome there. You might need therapy when you leave, though. As for the title of the next book, yes, I love it, too. My favorite title of anything I’ve ever titled. And I’ve titled a lot.
of course i do not miss them Bryan, i have downloaded them, printed in poster size and hanged on the building opposite my kitchen window
You sent chills up and down my spine with this one, and not the good kind! Very forlorn.
PS – Please tell me you didn’t get a cease and desist order for your previous header.
No cease and desist order! Although that would have made for a great poem!
Sorry about the chills!
this poem delves into loss of a loved one so well. i think this will touch many lives. hope all is well. have a great day.
I hope the entire collection will do that, N. Now I have to figure out – submit to contests and other publisher, or go the Sibling Rivalry Press route.
Nice piece of writing, Bryan.
I haven’t lost a parent. Mine, unfortunately, weren’t good parents anyway. I have experienced death though. It certainly changes you as a person, makes you weary, in body and spirit.
This is an excellent poem.
Thanks, Paul. I admit it – I was very lucky to have the father I did.
Brrrr on this as well…and I have been through it all so many times-
*BIG SIGH* b-dawg, my my my what an old soul you have my young friend, and for a reason- I suppose.
Marshall Borland marches down the path…
E Stelling
http://tmi-chef.blogspot.com/
Yeah I think you’re gonna connect with these poems, Chef.
Wish we lived closer! I’d have you over to cook!
Love that last line Bryan – perfect! Unfortunately I am about to join your camp as my mother has inoperable cancer and is on the downward slide. At least I have had time to say goodbye.
I’m so sorry about your mom, Gabrielle. I’ve often wondered which is preferable – because one’s mind wonders such things after loss – a slow goodbye or an unexpected loss. The truth? Girl, they both stink.
This site now seems much more accessible and less cluttered. I love it. For whatever reason, I had a hard time finding my way around the old site.
I’ve been an orphan for 15 years now and after all this time, the first four lines of this poem made me see the experience in an entire different way. Really powerful and almost fear provoking.
I don’t know if it’s proper to say this, but I enjoy reading your replies to people as much as I love your poems.
Pearl
As always: Beautiful poem! For someone like me, a kid of soon to be 22 years of age who has never really experienced a real loss, I guess I am still at the camp. But seeing my grandmother slowly fall down into the pit of Alzheimer’s while the rest of us are left with nothing to do but watch, it feels like I’m seeing my own mother and grandfather for the first time. It’s ironic how death brings out the “life” in people, like a cold winter night when we all have to build our own fire to survive, and we hover over it so close that the flames burn our flesh and leave a scar across our eyes. It’s impossible to see the world the same after that. But like I said, I’m still at the camp, just watching, waiting for the inevitable. Thank you for this poem Bryan…
Okay, so I’ve tried multiple times to articulate the emotions that this poem has stirred in me, but I just can’t find them. At least not words that I feel are adequate.
This poem is hauntingly beautiful. Thank you for sharing.