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Our Issues At Hand

Sarnat savors slow spring Sunday sitting
Snail’s pace in garden, eyes closed
Breathe in/out, absorb honey bee buzzes.

I renew an ongoing convo with Dad
Who 99 sadly passed away 12 years ago
But for very first time ‘little Gerry’

Somehow feels able to engage that man
Now in much richer living color 3-D
Which makes us become bit more vivid

& real than when actually together.
Maybe distance + hint maturity arrived
With self-aging make this possible.

As well as loving one other [always a given]
Each understands then can express
–Even reveal–what we were experiencing.

Whereas Father comes alive for Son
So satisfyingly nuanced, on a different hand
You Gerard are incapable of reaching

Such transcendence never happened with Mother
although cipher carried, gave me
Birth, milk, red hair, maiden name; unfortunately

Despite making best current effort
Nothing else surfaces continuing quest Monday
Gazing at parents visage in office

…Perhaps next phase…Sure dutiful boychick
Took good care, nurtured until she
Died at almost 103: at least one of my kids

Got upset by the big effort since
They’d heard about Daddy’s sense of neglect
Thus considered him a hypocrite.

Above said ‘n’ done, distinct image sticks from
Meditative reverie’s preservation
Still gut-deep of happy Howdy Doody childhood.

we know solipsistic drill

if your physician
over surveils
too many C.A.T.
scans, end up
identifying new
problems be
they real or not.

Now let’s just say
Gerard gets
this renal function
test scare
keeps him & wife
up all night
worried to death.

When reality told
ain’t exactly
true as you figure
wowwy how
great to kill extra
hours thrice
weekly: star writes

poems ‘bout our dialysis
maybe at home
while connives best fast
route to secure
with equanimity soon to
turn 78-year-old
stupid or poor kid’s kidney.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Gerard Sarnat has been nominated for the pending Science Fiction Poetry Association Dwarf Star Award, won San Francisco Poetry’s 2020 Contest, the Poetry in the Arts First Place Award plus the Dorfman Prize, and has been nominated for handfuls of Pushcarts plus Best of the Net Awards. Gerry is widely published including in 2023 San Diego Poetry Annual, 2022 Awakenings Review, 2022 Arts & Cultural Council of Bucks County Celebration, 2022 Rio Grande Valley International Poetry Festival Anthology, Pocket Samovar, Free State, The Broken City, Sandy River Review, Three Rooms Press/Maintenant, New World Writing, The Font, BigCityLit, HitchLit Review, Lowestoft, Washington Square Review, The Deronda Review, Jewish Writing Project, Hong Kong Review, Tokyo Poetry Journal, Buddhist Poetry Review, Gargoyle, Main Street Rag, New Delta Review, Arkansas Review, Hamilton-Stone Review, Northampton Review, New Haven Poetry Institute, Texas Review, Vonnegut Journal, Brooklyn Review, San Francisco Magazine, Monterey Poetry Review, The Los Angeles Review, and The New York Times as well as by NYU, Slippery Rock, Northwestern, Pomona, Harvard, Stanford, Dartmouth, Penn, Columbia, North Dakota, McMaster, Maine, University of British Columbia and University of Chicago and University of Virginia presses. He is a Harvard College and Medical School-trained physician who’s built and staffed clinics for the disenfranchised as well as a Stanford professor and healthcare CEO. Currently he is devoting energy/ resources to deal with climate justice, and serves on Climate Action Now’s board. Gerry’s been married since 1969 with progeny consisting of four collections (Homeless Chronicles: From Abraham To Burning Man, Disputes, 17s, Melting the Ice King) plus three kids/ six grandsons — and is looking forward to potential future granddaughters.

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