The Question

When his lithe

teen-aged daughter,

knocked on the door,

on the bolted door,

knocked to say hello,

was he alive?

Was he alive

when she shook the brass knob,

smudged with desperate sweat,

his volatile absence,

as she shook the brass knob

hollow, then heavy in her hand?

Like his older brother,

ten years before.

Just like him,

three daughters,

one and then two

in close succession.

Both men:

failed farmer,

lost land,

gone generations.

Yet not exactly alike:

not the shotgun

his big brother used.

Not how it rang out

in front of family,

abrupt ringing indictment.

Unlike his elder brother’s,

his was prolonged:

addict’s swollen face,

years of slow decay,

next chronic away,

then lonely chemical gone.

Let us tell her

he had already been long dead,

whether we know it or not.

Let us tell her

there was nothing

she could have done.

As we tell ourselves,

there was nothing

any of us

could have done.

(cc) Karen G. Johnston