The Family Doctor Gloomy Grammarians
Kleinbard, David
David Kleinbard The Family Doctor The octogenarian can't look me in the eye. His wife, young at sixty, steers his hand From mouth to plate, then smiles at air. Once family doctor, he shuffles from...
...I take her home...
...We go with friends to Maxwell's Plum...
...Newspaper addict, he cancels Post and Times...
...Grizzled, dyed, we grope Around old age...
...Who knows...
...Her son thinks she still loves The tall intrusion at the door, His vague image makes her smile...
...My brother says "No more...
...Gloomy Grammarians Gloomy grammarians, phony liberals In red and gray, in tweed and flannel, Shockproof, downed, and gaberdined...
...How is my wife, who has been ill...
...All afternoon the questions come to help: How is my first wife's brother, once mad...
...How is my wife's mother, who can't recall That we have phoned or if she paid her rent...
...It's not senility, at other times His brain's in tune, but heaviness of after sleep In one who dozes half the day...
...Once family doctor, he shuffles from chair To chair on knees of pain, waiting For the unpredictable fall, the synapse lapse...
...At night she wanders The house, turning spigots on, yanking Out drawers, shrieking like a macaw Wild, invisible above the Amazon In joy, in rage, in misery...
...Pacing the dank hall of the home, I have Until four to give them all she has Or take her back...
...His slippers try the spiral stair...
...My mother is curious About the barefaced body in the glass...
...My brother who has spent Many an hour of the last five years Nursing, wiping, combing, washing her Until despair has dwindled Into this chaos of the newborn...
...At lunch he can't recall his thought...
...No nurse slays with me...
...You'll have to do it all Yourself...
...Far less remote than years gone by...
...And how am I, whose train was late...
...But then she always has liked men...
...Our parents have lost Their minds...
...There's nothing she can name...
Vol. 124 • November 1997 • No. 20
