A Portrait of the Artist While Looking for his Cell Phone - David Handsher

[Lawrence Robinson]

A Portrait of the Artist While Looking for his Cell Phone

As I retrace my steps 
my mind 
goes too far 
and I am now sitting in sand 
on the first day of school and 
I look across the playground 
and Blackberry Elementary School 
has the smell 
of hot tar in the September sun 
and everyone is gone and the bell 
calling us back to class must 
have gone off and I am 
the lone survivor of some 
unspeakable tragedy 
but now I am riding in the back 
of a Pontiac and the cool breeze flows 
through the open windows 
and my father with his stiff mustache 
and twitching fingers drives 
and my mother sits 
with hands on her lap 
and my brother and sister are there too 
and I am pointing saying 
“moo cow” “moo cow” 
over and over again 
and everyone laughs 
but I know that “moo cow” sounds 
so much better than just “cow” 
and just before I hear the ring
as if from a distant place,
underneath the couch pillow,
the phone demanding my attention
and I hear my daughter asking
if it is a good time to drop off
our grandson, I am waking and
I see my bed surrounded by 
vinyl backed kitchen chairs
in our first apartment on Cabanne
where we share a bedroom
and I know I am alive.

	- David Handsher
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