FOR FREEMAN HOUSE
I could grow old with you, Freeman,
two woodrats drunk half the time
in a shack way up the Klamath,
with not much left to do
but complain about our teeth and livers,
wonder where the money went,
and watch the river move.
Once a month, if we can beat
another old pickup into running,
we’ll clatter down to Eureka for supplies,
maybe give them kids some gambling lessons
and the Humboldt coeds a hopeful tumble.
Two weeks later, still recovering,
I can see you give the cookpot
a slow, appraising stir,
nodding with a resignation so deep
it’s joyful,
“Venison stew again.”
Spoons scraping the wooden bowls,
we eat in front of the fireplace,
jawing about this and that:
how many gut-busting stones
we lugged for the hearth;
why the salmon are late this year;
the relative merits of Huskies and McCullochs;
the continuing decline of the novel;
why Ann left Willy back in ’88;
how on a freezing Skagit Valley morning once
we saw a flock of two hundred geese
wheel above us and turn into snow.
And the days go by like the stories and river
into whatever comfort we deserve.
We eat the stew, laughing.
And the days go by like the sun and moon,
gloriously indifferent
to us crazy old men full of lies,
gumming venison as we slowly grow
helpless and forgetful,
retelling the old stories to keep them new,
till after many meals
the wooden bowl wears through.