Scribble Me a Poem

Scribble me a poem, dear Dad,

because you're making excuses for not writing.

You can’t see the cranes of the typewriter

now gathering dust.

The tomato soup is empty, the prunes hard.

You mixed them for me at breakfast this winter,

in a glass bowl glazed with last week’s soup,

but I drew the line at eating that crap,

microwaved with loving ingenuity

by a child of the first Great Depression.

At this moment you must be practicing

your North Korean marching steps

over your couch piled high with the New York Times.

You face the golden mist of a San Francisco dawn,

where the spire of Grace Cathedral thrusts the air.

Scribble me a poem, I say,

but it must be me I’m commanding, dreaming of the Baltics,

facing a palm tree,

waiting for hummingbirds

to meditate along with me.

(From your son Ari - yes, that one.)