Marianne Szlyk

Trust

After Roy Hargrove and Felino A. Soriano

The father was a musician,

playing his trumpet at home 

each day without brushstrokes,

bright piano, or shards of flute

that gathered around him at night.

His horn’s scale climbed a bit,

like kids do outside.  He always

kept them safe. His notes didn’t 

stumble on hard earth.

An adult, the son scattered words 

like the flute’s notes in “Trust.”   Slanted

stepped down the page.  The last letter

held back, kept itself from falling.

Children/run/  ning leapt from the porch,

expecting grass to be there, as the son, 

now a father watching, wrote words 

that still fly.  

 

Thelma in Bushwick

Finding her way back to where

walls stand blank in blistering heat,

she almost misses the house, 

the last wooden one on this street,

its paint fading to silver,

its gingerbread carvings intact.

Imagining it’s cool inside, 

she pictures herself with her friend 

drinking tumblers of ice water. 

But dust and heat thicken stagnant air.

She would choke on just that alone.

She shakes her head.  She must visit

her old friend, the last she keeps up with.

Imagining a warm welcome,

she rings the doorbell.  She knows it will be

otherwise in that place. 

Still, she wishes she could trust her friend again.

 

The Prince Trusts He Will See Rapunzel

Someday I will walk past

that shut-up house again,

thin house where Rapunzel 

lives, herbal-scented hair

flowing past scabbed ankles,

past bare feet.  The witch has

brought her here, all

high towers having failed.

Here there are no flowers,

only weeds and lank trees.

But the house remains

when so much else does not.

Ghosts of the men who built

this house can’t peel open

the shutters, paint fading

beside brilliant ash leaves

while Rapunzel waits, dust

motes swimming around her,

while the witch turns herself

to milkweed in the wind.

Everyone else forgets her,

my Rapunzel.