Father’s Day 2016

Father’s Day 2016
 
His handwriting had never been good.
He always printed at a slant and had this
way of mixing both capital and lower-case
letters in the same words and sentences.
 
Going through some of his belongings,
I find the pad of legal paper on Father’s
Day, my first without him, his
first without us. He has noted four
 
phone numbers, three with his local
734 area code. He had scrawled
“HYATT--7th & HaGGarTy,” the hotel
we always stayed in when we visited
 
him. And then, below that, the sentence
“Whales live in the blue ocean,” which
is mystifying. Not that they live there,
but that he’d write it, and all in lower
 
case cursive letters, except for the capital
W, these the only other words bobbing
amongst the numerals in the yellow sea
somewhere between the straight blue waves.

 
 
 
 
  
The Truth About
 
And the cat is busy
and why not? Someone is out
there accelerating down Olive Ave.,
driving the machines which provide the sound-
track for my dreams. Why not expect
to be fed at 4 a.m.? Then full,
 
why not stretch into the green throw
blanket and bathe? The dog
will not stir, not even peek one fuzzy
ear over the blanket once. He knows
the truth about 4 a.m. and heaven
knows someone in the house must seek it.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Something New Might Be Revealed
 
My ex-husband used to give me this look:
you are over-thinking. He knew better
than to say it aloud. But his silent frustration
 
would indicate that over-thinking is a choice;
that is, I overthink on purpose, which is something .
to think about. And after a long day deliberating,
 
an over-thinker sometimes simply needs to
watch the Family Feud. Another over-thinker
may say that this is rationalizing
 
bad behavior. But it’s not. The over-thinker
stays home and over-thinks, avoids crowds,
which muddle thoughts, and analyzes even
 
the weary traffic light for semantic meaning.
The over-thinker occasionally thinks I need
to get out more. But she usually elects to stay
 
inside and think. For a break, she might read
or re-alphabetize and organize her books.
The enlightened over-thinker will recognize
 
these penchants--will acknowledge them--but
will continue to over-think in her own way:
thinking as illusory means of control: if I think this
 
out in advance, nothing can get me! It’s crap,
of course, especially with our country’s penchant
to terrorize itself any more. (But I digress.) If
 
you are an over-thinker, you have plenty of
company, although this might not occur to you
because you are too busy ruminating to see
 
you are surrounded by over-thinkers each sitting
atop the their own boulder, pondering. The world
is as populated by over-thinkers as Iowa is
 
populated by rows of corn, and the nearest
over-thinker might be as close as your elbow.
Only your thinking blocks the view. But here
 
we are, the rest of the over-thinkers, also
surmising, wondering, wandering solo through
ideas as if exploring a maze of greenery, maybe
 
calculating by woods, or perhaps if you’re
more organized and linear in your thinking,
discerning through symmetrical fields of towering
 
maize, applying meaning willy-nilly, though
we will never admit the willy-nilly part.
 
 
© Kimberly Williams