The Puppy, Part 2

The reference is to this previous poem about an incident in my life from the middle 1990s.

THE PUPPY, PART 2

I’m more of a man than you, dad.

I killed the puppy

When it returned

From wherever you took it,

Unlike you,

Who couldn’t do it

With the puppies in Flint

You couldn’t immediately get rid of.

I proved it

To my self

In my mind

I’m more of a man

Than you, dad.

I was sad

But controlled it.

No tears.

I was angry

It took too many shots

Before the puppy

Stopped moving

And was truly dead.

But in it all

I was more of a man

Than you, dad.

Even as

Your innuendoes

And your put-downs

About me

Being less of a man

Less sexual of a man

Rang in my brain.

Violence, not power

Is the ultimate aphrodisiac

In too many minds.

A dead puppy

Is now humus

Across a quarter-century

Of time and space.

And across that stretch

I have let go a little bit

Of the perceived need

To prove myself to you.

Poem: Too soon to tell

TOO SOON TO TELL

A new job.

New bosses. New responsibilities.

Not-so-new computers.

Anger. Antsiness. Impatience. Control issues.

Was this the right decision?

Did I choose wisely in coming here?

Per Zhou Enlai,

When he was asked about the success

Of the French Revolution:

“It’s too soon to tell.”

It’s too soon to tell.

My mind will be a jumble

And even a bit shell-shocked

For more than a month.

Will weekend visits to Austin help?

To the degree they do,will they be worth the price?

It’s too soon to tell.

Was it just fear of change?

Or was my intuition correctly ringing out

A blaze of three alarms or more?

Should I have suffered

Through yet more feelings of being trapped,

Through low-grade ongoing anxieties,

Rather than the potential of high-voltage unknowns?

It’s too soon to tell.

When I left Dallas for Odessa,

The first domino of moving to fall in this chain,

After two months of unemployment,

Anxious over job hunting,

And recognizing the severity of the recession,

Yet loath to move

And depressed as I drove across the Permian,

Was it good or bad?

It’s too soon to tell.

Good and bad are relative, and utilitarian;

I did nothing “wrong” any of these times.

But I made decisions

In uncertainty, without knowing even

Rough percentages on outcomes.

And, so, in that utilitarian sense,

As to whether these choices were good or bad?

It’s too soon to tell.

December 26, 1963 – was it good or bad?

It’s too soon to tell.

            Jan. 3, 2012