Oh, Lenny of the slick ducktail
and low-slung levis.
Crumpled cigs in the sleeve of your T-shirt.
Oh, Lenny of the red convertible and ice-blue eyes.
French kisser, unhooker of bras.
Where are you now?
And Peg of much bosom and
home-permy hairdo.
Crumpled wet Kleenex in a
weeping pocket.
Oh, Peg of high aspirations and
tugged-up green skirt.
Queen attendant, slow at math
and jokes,
Where are you now?
Oh, Lenny, famed for hook shots
and wham-bamming dunks.
Cruiser of Main Street, begetter
of children.
And Peg of strapless gown and
plastic sandals fame.
Crinolines, cinch belt, loosened
knees.
Where, oh, where, are you now?
Underground, both of them, deep
underground
With separate heartbreak in
separate graves.
NOT KNOWING
He said, looking up from the pillow, We
didn't know it would be like this. I pulled the covers over his wasted
shoulders. Me here. You here. We didn't know. I hesitated, evasive as our mother ever was.He stared at the ceiling and repeated, We
didn't know.
**
Not knowing what was on the other side of the hill, we waited, prone in the
tall grass. Not knowing if the bad guys had heard us coming, we waited and
listened, exchanged silent signals. Not knowing how many they were, or how
heavily armed, we sweated and gestured each other forward, belly-crawling up
the sandy hill.
Our beanstick horses were tied to a sassafras down in the hollow. We each had a
pistol loaded with a new roll of caps. We each had a cowboy hat. We each had a
badge, but he was the deputy, because I was oldest.
At the top of the hill, we stood up and yelled, Drop them guns, you
good-fer-nothin' varmints. You're headed for the hoosegow. One of the sidewinders tried to draw, but a quick
bullet knocked the gun out of his hand. Good shootin', pardner, I told my trusty sidekick. He squinted his eyes
like Roy Rogers, waved a hand at the cowardly outlaws, said, Let's
tie 'em up and git goin'.
**
Not knowing what was around the river bend, he waded in water up to his knees.
Not knowing if they had made noise or if there was anyone to hear it, he waved
a silent signal to the men coming up behind him. Not knowing how many were
hidden in front of them, or how heavily armed, they moved forward.
The day before, he'd picked up three replacements, one young grunt was from his
hometown. Driving back along the jungle road, they talked. As the boy stepped
out of the jeep, one foot already on the ground; something went in one side of
the kid's head and out the other.
Now the other two waded behind him. They were nineteen, older than he was when
he enlisted. It was their first mission. It was his third tour of duty in
Vietnam.
He came home full of chemicals, but did not know it. Death gnawed slowly on his
bullet-scarred body, taking first his locomotion, then his speech, finally,
mercifully, his mind.
**
Not knowing, we unsaddled our beansticks and put them in the corral. Not
knowing, we walked home across the outfields, laughing and walking tall, our
shiny badges gleaming in the sunlight. Not knowing, we walked toward the future.
Janice D. Soderling is a former contributor to Innisfree. Her current and scheduled work appears in
The Pedestal, Blue Unicorn, New Verse News, Soundzine, Concise Delight,
Literary Mama, Left Hand Waving, Loch Raven Review, Lucid Rhythms, Unsplendid (USA),
Anon, Lyric Poetry Magazine (Scotland), The Centrifugal Eye (Canada)
Horizon Review, Borealis (England), The Flea, The Chimaera (Australia),
and the recently released Best of Our Stories anthology. Her
poetry was nominated by the Australia-based Shit Creek Review in 2009
for Dzanc Best of the Web, Sundance Best of the Net, and Pushcart.
She lives in a small Swedish village.
