I was sitting in one of the exam rooms at Mayo Hospital New Prague last Friday, very despondent. I had just been told that I would be having surgery on my left ankle at 2:15 pm that very afternoon. This brought back a flood of bad memories of other past late Junes in my life. I concede that there have been many very enjoyable late Junes throughout my life, but as of the last nine years, the enjoyable ones are fewer, and the ones with nasty surprises more plentiful. This is a poem that encapsulates what I was feeling last Friday.
THE LATE OF JUNE
The Late of June
a time in the past
of anticipated vacations,
fourth of July fireworks,
grilled brats and hamburgers
with beer and sipped frozen daiquiris,
escapes from the heat and humidity
dipped into the frolic and laughter
of cool Minnesotan lakes.
Star gazing on the cool, cut lawn
of the farm, while the sound
of the National Anthem closed out
another day of television broadcasting.
The Late of June,
sitting on the front deck
with the dog.
a brandy manhattan
moths and mosquitoes,
watching and toasting
the brilliant flashing colors
of city fireworks,
their sound,
echoing and booming
off the buildings of Main Street,
as surrounding neighbors
play a duet with their
supermarket bought fireworks
The Late of June
has taken on the character
of the Ides of March,
about which Shakespeare
warns us of betrayal.
Assassins’ cries,
the gleam of light
too little, too late
the awareness raised
of flashing, descending blades
soon to be dyed blood brown
a prone, dying Julius
whispering, “Et tu, Brute?”
The late of June 2011,
the dream of brats and beer
and fireworks transformed
into a MRSA quarantined room,
yellow gowned nurses with gloved hands,
the sound of squeaky wheels at 6 a.m.,
my squinting eyes looking through
the sudden, blinding light,
a blood tech’s greeting,
tourniquet tight around my arm,
as a gloved finger vainly pokes
for a vein not already blown
and scarred by vancomycin,
as the needle held in the other gloved hand
eagerly awaits a target.
A Late of June introduction
into a nightmare of multiple surgeries,
failed antibiotics, near death,
hipless, walker-hopping months,
Shakespeare’s warning ringing
loudly in my ears.
The Late of June 2018,
my mother’s memory unity stay,
cut short by the snap of her left femur,
onset of pneumonia,
the weeklong vigil at her bedside
as the breath of God
filling her lungs, slowly
retreats from her body,
as she ever so gently, gradually, quietly
slips into the fullness of God’s reign.
Funeral home picture boards,
filled reminders of her former life,
of dreams fulfilled and unfulfilled,
surrounded by memories
and those who created those memories
buried with her in the earth,
alongside the life memories
of my father and my sister.
The Late of June 2019,
descending the steps of retirement,
a long life of service to others,
resulting in a painfilled wince
as ankle bones break
and separate from ligaments.
Sitting on cement steps,
then prone on an emergency room bed,
the surgical sentence postponed
for four days later,
the verdict delivered,
and the nightmares of 2011
flood and fill my dreams
as I slip into the sleep of anesthesia.
The Late of June,
harbinger of loss and disappointment?
I sit in my chair, my ankle elevated,
walker at hand for memory laden
hops to the bathroom, to chair, to bed.
A world seemingly upside down
filled with calamity, pain and more loss.
Is there a safe room, a safe house
into which to escape
these seven last days of June?
A full voiced shout to the Almighty,
“Now what?!”
Silence … it is always silence,
God’s usual answer to disciples.
I guess I will just have to
figure out on my own
the answer I seek.
