I’ll drink to that.” He would often say. And he did for years.
At the funeral, it was clear that his life had seen a reversal. The funeral was an open mic for all those he had helped overcome alcoholism. Needless to say, it was a long service.
After this open mic funeral, we all made a procession or parade to the Italian Catholic cemetery. I was carrying all the roses that would become our prayers thrown down into the crypt where the family had put his ashes alongside his parents, a cousin and a beloved pet dog.
I got there late with the roses, as I got lost, being neither Italian or catholic, I didn’t know where the old cemetery was. Turns out it is in a town filled with cemeteries. And it was hard to distinguish one plot of bodies from another. I stopped at the 7-11 and had to ask.
“Where is the Italian cemetery? It would be at the top of the hill. The Italians are like that. They like the best view, and have the biggest tombstones. They did well in the Bay Area, back in the day….” He continued, but I was late. Gratze I responded, and bolted my little mini up the hill towards the top, carrying all those potential prayers anxiously.
Turns out they had just started praying and crying when I got there. Men in old black suits and fedora hats; women in hippie garb and long fluid dresses in Bay breezes. And there was weeping as we pulled off the lid and remembered having buried our little cousin just last month.
And there was thanks for the parents just beside his fresh ashes.
And the red roses and prayers were not too late after all. As both fell in all directions, over his ashes, I’m sure.

The Sticker collector
He had collected them, since being a kid—things which adhered to many surfaces, interested him.
As a child he had mapped his doors with stickers. To enter into his young domain, was to see a visual tale of everywhere he had ever been.
And even then, in the small neighborhood, he was well traveled.
He knew each cat, each dog, each lamppost, each tree-all by name. Some of which, he himself had named.
He perceived himself as a namer of things. But also a collector. But why he had gotten obsessed with stickers, was a mystery even to him.
Was it the instantness of placement? That is that you can stick and sticker nearly anywhere, and have an instant sign or symbol. Or was it that they were so portable before they found their permanent home. Or was it that you can do so much with so little. Regardless, stickers and magnets had always fascinated him.
Why things stick together-why marriages or families have that invisible, unspoken glue between them all. That’s what he figured at least, about why he had become a sticker collector.

The Collector….

He had collected them, since being a kid—things which adhered to many surfaces, interested him. As a child he had mapped his doors with stickers. To enter into his young domain, was to see a visual tale of everywhere he had ever been. And even then, in the small neighborhood, he was well traveled. He knew each cat, each dog, each lamppost, each tree-all by name. Some of which, he himself had named. He perceived himself as a namer of things. But also a collector. But why he had gotten obsessed with stickers, was a mystery even to him. Was it the instantness of placement? That is that you can stick and sticker nearly anywhere, and have an instant sign or symbol. Or was it that they were so portable before they found their permanent home. Or was it that you can do so much with so little. Regardless, stickers and magnets had always fascinated him. Why things stick together-why marriages or families have that invisible, unspoken glue between them all. That’s what he figured at least, about why he had become a sticker collector. //AnotherHe nearly ran into the bar he always went to, declaring, “I’m surely going to hell!”The few friends he normally saw there daily, weren’t there this day. So people sort of shuffled their chairs away from him as he made his declaration. The bar was dark that afternoon, aside from the beer signs which the owner had collected for years. Some of them had moving horses and women crossing and re-crossing their legs over and over. That’s what he noticed first as he sat down to have a local beer. No one approached him. You have to give and man room, each of us thought to ourselves while looking back at our phones or books as if we didn’t notice. People in those sorts of existential crisis, surely need room, we all justified to ourselves. Then a very tall man came in wearing a cowboy hat and carrying what seemed to be his granddaughter, judging from their age differences and similar features. He put the little girl down and ordered a burger with onion rings, and a grill cheese. The little girl, wearing a barbie pink frilly dress, immediately went up to the other man, and asked boldly, “How is your day going sir?”“Not so good, little friend.”“Why?” The little girl inquisitively asked. “My dad died, and I wasn’t there.” He said while looking into thin air away from the girl. “I’m sorry for your loss sir.” She responded. “Why did you want to be there sir?”“I could’ve helped him cross over little friend.”:”Cross over what?” She genuinely asked. Just then the tall man came to the table and noticing the girl talking to the man, asked him—hey do you mind if I sit down, my little granddaughter here seems to have taking a liking to you.”With his hand, the man welcomed him to the small wooden pine table. Everyone in the bar, had a sigh of relief as one does, when a father returns home happy to be back with his children. //TO TOKE OR NOT TO TOKEHe had never liked the stuff, but it was one of those days.He and his wife had been fighting, and his kids were still at school. He had hours to kill, and wasn’t feeling so good about himself. “Sure, I’ll take a one hit” he said as his friends passed it around the table.“But you don’t smoke.” his best friends said.“No, I don’t come to think of it.”He handed it back into the circle, left the table, and went back home, wondering if he had missed something. //HIS SUITSHe kept his two suits ready on the back door hanger, just in case it happened again. Someone would surely die soon, he thought. It’s just a matter of time and days. Better be ready. That one I’ll use for the service, and that one for the wake. Always be ready. One day a young woman from next door came and knocked on his back door. She was the one who took care of her aging mother, and rarely spoke when gardening. He was surprised to see her, and also to have a knock at the back door, which no one but him ever used. He was thinking the worst. “Hello neighbor, I’m sorry to bother you, but my mother was wondering if you would like to come over for tea later today. She calls it high tea, as she was born in England, so for her it is a formal affair. Would you be interested?”Immediately, he found himself responding, “Yes, should I wear a suit?”//He wanted to share the first thunderstorm of the year with his friends. So he left his books and writing and rushed down to his local bar. Remembering his mother’s words, “It is never good to be in a storm alone.”//I have the gift of beholding very deeply. Thanks. It’s actually raining! We forgot to be thankful, until! Thanks God. That day, when the elderly man I was working with said—“I’m dying so I know stuff-just know that you are loved and named, and treat other’s the same.” It stuck with me, that.

Everything had since gone rotten, until he got this new camera lens.
He had waited patiently both to pick out and receive the new seeing device. It was from an old German arial war camera, and the lens had its own story of seeing things. He wanted to add a chapter or two to its already long and precise journey of seeing.
When it finally arrived after three months, as if arriving from the German front somewhere long ago, he kept it in the box and wrappings for weeks, until just the right moment, when he could be present with the wonder of this new lens.
He wanted to learn what it could see, that he couldn’t yet.
Everything in him couldn’t wait to see through it! A whole new way of perception was waiting there in that box. Perhaps, he would understand history better, and even see things around him in a way he had never imagined. He kept the box by his bed, until just the right morning.
Then his dog died in that night, and he forgot about the special lens, until just today.

Mary’s return was just like Jesus’.

Mary recovered, having lost only her hair. “Cancer is tough, but I wanted another beer with you guys”, she said upon her return.
“When in concentrations camps, the ones who made it, had a clear motivation of something they had left to do! Mine was sitting right here, having a beer with you fine people.”
Wheel-chaired now, she laughs even louder at our jokes, and makes fun of her leg for not working. “If I have to get a peg leg, I’ll name her Peggy and introduce her at parties!” Some people are just like that. Mary is.
She returned like a bald Jesus to us, just to hang out with us, and listen to our stupid jokes.

What’s in a name

He had been at every party, but no one knew his name. He decided to wear a name tag like at a tacky business convention or church fellowship.
But even that caused people to shy away from him.
One friend whispered to me: “Anyone who needs to wear a name tag never heard their name in the first place.” There was something too that.
His father had actually named him Convictus after some old Roman war book he was reading at the time of his son’s death.
Of course, with a name like that, he had to shorten it to not be bullied in school. He chose a sort of rap version—Con Man, which he later shortened to Conny. People seemed to relate to the name Conny better, but as few had ever met a Conny, few could remember his name.
One day in high school, a beautiful girl came over to him, and said, “I really like how unique your name is Conny.” He blushed and couldn’t speak to girls for years.
In those years, he started going to church with his grandmother.
On one bright yellow orange Sunday morning, the minister was preaching on Jesus’ baptism. All he heard of the whole sermon, was the part where Jesus’ “Heavenly Father” was speaking his son’s name so that everyone could hear him.
“So The Father liked pronouncing his son’s name out loud! He wasn’t a secret agent but a named son.” After that, he always like Jesus.
That sermon stuck with him for life, and when he died, he instructed them to write: “Here lies the beloved Conny Convictus. Loved son of a Father of all our names.”

Grieve like a man the stoic rock cries
But I’m a waiting to release bent dandelion myself
I will cry at will if necessary despite what the rocks say.
I am
Another part of the story
Something easily toppled by wind
Or maybe on good days, like a desert reed-hoping,
Praying woodwinds are God’s favorites.

Working on this very short story about grief. Enjoy:

It was twilight again and I was cleaning out my parents house.
In the dark garage was my father’s old convertible-an eggshell blue MG 1973-whose top was always down.
But I won’t clean that space today-too dusty I’m sure-not yet. I haven’t found the keys anyway.
I’ll play the records as I clean. I’ll catalogue which ones have scratches and exactly where in each song. That’s a good start.
My parents, at least they weren’t horders. That would be worse. Plus my boss said have the week off, until you feel success. Odd use of that word, I thought. How can one do this successfully anyway.
Well, there won’t be any alcohol, so I’ll have her bring some in the evening. Maybe we could sit on the porch and have a hot toddy, and listen to the least scratched albums…
But it’s probably all that big band crap or even tuba music. Still, I may find some jazz in the stacks somewhere, I pray.
What’s the right music to start the day? I’ll play mom’s favorite from that blind Italian jew. Yeah, that will set the tone. There’s implied hope at least in the fact that a blind man can sing like that!
The needle drops electric level releases the weight of the songs. And that tiny blue white gold light of glowing tubes glows again The old metal arm, with that glow play light illuminates the room. All those years, I never dared do anything but listen. Now I’m the DJ. It’s up to me to play these records, to see them through to the next generation or even eternity.
Twilight passes into that glow. And maybe we never know, what dust the sun must pass through to create such glory.
Maybe that’s why he always kept the top off that convertible . Fuck it, I think I’ll start in the garage after all.
Now, where are those keys.

We all
Have
Much deeper
Things to say
To one another
Than can be spoken
Today; still we pronounce
What can be said
Between us,
Until the whole
Sentence is
Eventually formed by faith
In that space
Of attempted
Silence
Which hourly
Passes between
Us.

//
In the dream
God would throw me objects
To juggle. Sometimes, they were
Just too much (kitchen sink, a puppy, a huge log), but
I kept catching them
And throwing them upwards.
Eventually He had Grace
And partially suspended gravity
So I could juggle
In slow motion
And experience the unbearable lightness of being…that is,
Until I felt
Accomplished enough
To at least
Entertain my own angels.

//
I made barbecue sauce today
The honey made it happier
That is, glad to be itself
Finally and shared with the world.

I’m sure God feels the same!

//
I wear lots of wrist watches
Started when I was young
I’m not trying to escape time
Just want to keep an eye on it
As I pass through. I mean my
Friends are all over the world
So having different moments than me.
I like to think of what part of day they are inside of
Encountering, as I meet our Father Time in mine.

//
Paris bridge
Man going to jump
Only art supplies
And a bible
In my pockets.
That, strangely
Seemed to have been
Enough. We exchanged names
And are friends to this day.

//
Meeting famous people-
Easy, if you see all people
As already immortal. Stardom here,
Is just a redundancy.

//
A Rhine of orange peel
In my honey today
Taught me Awe of zest again.

//
Why people chose
To mow in the heat of afternoon
Is a mystery of suffering to me.
But so is, the fact that it bothers me
So much.

//
As a kid in church:
Church steeples, how
A woman’s body moves when listening to heaven in prayer,
A wafer
A quake
And candy
During visitor’s welcome;
Not to mention rolling under pews
To try to get towards whatever
The preacher was really saying
To us all.
The sound of turning pages
And clinking of communion glasses
And the thought of lunch
Kept me seeking
And rolling on.

Wisdom

How deeply to engage
How much to know
Which doors to knock on softly
And which to break down with force
(Especially in people’s hearts). And, of course,
How to do both
In Love.
“A butterfly can break through
A window
At the right angle
And with precise timing.
I’m sure it’s the same
With doors,” she whispers
To me, gently.

//

We were in danger
Of becoming a thing
So, a few protested loudly
Vehemently against
The it-ing of human as machine.
While so,
On the other side
Of the world.
A Butterly lifted slowly
Off an orchid
Having drunk her
Fill of delight.

//

We are….

“The temple that can move and think and feel”

We are
Alive
Whether
We are born temples
Could be extraneous information
But that we
Are being built
Together as one
Seems
Overt
To me.
I pray today
To be
A doorknob
At least.

//
If all is immortal
Even before it was or is
Then this day
Should be unique.
At least your laughter
Should make us all
Glad, if even
Not fully aware
Of our happiness.