24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
September 2016 will be three years.
You went to a party.
Your phone pinged a tower near your home.
Then to now.
No word.
Friends, family, law enforcement, strangers,
dogs and divers, planes and pedestrians have searched.
When harvest happened that fall, all expected you to be found,
your car, something.
Nothing but nothing.
Still today.
Your parents old before their time,
waiting. a community questioning how and why and where?
Still.
Nothing
Nowhere
How? Even your car. Vanished.
Alone I stand
in this barren land
Don’t know what happened
in life as I’ve gone
Don’t know how
I just don’t know
But I am here now
no home to have
No job no food no family
I’m sad.
The days have come
and the days have gone
Time goes by
another sad song
I don’t know how
to get myself back
where I was before
I slacked
I just want to eat
sometimes to die
the loneliness it eats away
No family abides
Not wanted
No one wants to deal with me
I am a sight to see!
Where I lay my head
is my home
whether it’s dirt or sand or cement
I’m still alone
I quietly beg
embarrassed to say
but this is what I do
each and every day
With each decision
to stay behind
or move ahead
or go with or without
we slide
a little to the left
or right
each time
a different path of sudden realties
like getting a massage on the way home
instead of going to the party
and your right contact lens falls out
which probably wouldn’t have happened had you gone to the party
instead.
Missing since: May 15, 1970 from Chicago, Illinois
Age: 62 years old
Clothing/jewelry: A cocktail dress and jewelry
She tries the dress on carefully;
Smooths the fabric with careful fingers,
Twists and turns before the glass.
“I like it” she says
And lifts the room with a quiet, shy smile.
“I’ll take it, please. Just wrap it for me here.”
The dress is blue:
A scattering of cornflowers marks the neck and hem.
The colour of her eyes.
I tell her this and watch her smile again.
“My favourite flower” she says.
‘My husband buys them for our anniversary.”
I wrap the dress.
Hide matching gloves inside the heavy folds.
She lifts the package, smiles, and walks away.
© Anne McMaster 2016
Cows mooed as I held your trembling torso
through the seizures.
Your eyes reflected the moon when you came to;
I startled at my first womanly moment.
I knew I wanted to lay down, and stroke you breastbone to navel.
My fumbling reinforced your recovery.
You wouldn’t let me be late.
That was your excuse.
I didn’t have the emotional vocabulary to truck with your banter,
or you would have been my first
instead of, years later, a man who didn’t know
what he was taking
under the canopy.
Our breath fogged in front of us
as we jogged back to your beat-up jeep
and rolled past the lake,
at once,
austere and serene.
You made me laugh, all the way home
but I felt your panic.
The porch light was on,
and you reached past me
to open my door.
When
who and how to love is a mystery
what to do to be happy is insurrmountable
where to go to find purpose is impossible
and if any of it matters
is how you live.
Then
Lost
is how you live
does finding you matter
is searching for purpose possible
and can happiness become you
or will these mysteries fade
like wisps of soke
Are like the rain
Falling from above
Giving people a
Feeling of relief.
She lived in East Vancouver,
or, Edmonton, or, Winnipeg, or, Toronto
She left the Rez when at thirteen.
Young, thin, single, beautiful and battered.
It’s said she met the pig farmer once,
but to this day no one knows that for sure.
She was last seen in two thousand and twelve,
in a needle exchange shop in B.C..
She asked if she could get needles for a friend.
Alberta was cold on January 5th,
the baby’s untimely reception even colder
Daddy was dead, frozen in a field,
the family claims it was the police, no one knows
Mommy was addicted to crack, as too the baby
The child lost a child at twelve
A picture shows a smile and dark eyes to adore
There are only two and the second is blurry
She left an unknown life to a life unknown
Is she missing? Is she dead?
The question is, does anyone really care?
A happy family filled with joy and humour
Every day included tales of some missing things
Some found after a long search, some never to be found
Till one day, their young daughter went missing
Everyone was stunned and refused to accept
“How could a child not return from school?”
The police swarmed each house and passerby with questions
Everyone who knew the child was out on the streets with her photo
They retraced the path she took to return from school, endlessly
Gloom descended, every heart who knew the child was filled with pain
The memories of her smile, her innocence were the topic of discussion
The family tried to hold the thread of hope, despite the strain
The air was filled with prayers to return her home safely
Friends, relatives, neighbours were ready to chip in for her ransom
Every search turned futile, time brought only despair as she remained missing
the sound poured out the sink, flowed out the washer, dripped off my hands… surely this house would be cleaned