Grady Means

Grady Means Poems

The Best Poem Of Grady Means

Fixed Income

4: 30 a.m. and I'm wide awake
thinking, sweating, listening
The distinctive, middle-pitched tone
Of water running through pipes
Somewhere in the house

4: 30 a.m. is my special time
When I've always stared and worried
About parents, children, job, and retirement,
cancer, death, marriage, or some slight
At the office or the dinner table

My ears are very finely tuned
For that sort of thing.
The loose shutter, the expanding
Joints of the ductwork,
Doors opening and closing.

Drip, Drip, Drip
I have filled our roof-top tank
With financial mysteries …
401Ks, defined benefits, savings,
Bond ladders, mutual funds …
And its magic must now be an engine that
Runs forever.

In my country, the rains have stopped
And will never come again
And so I go up
To measure the water level
Every day.

I worry that our plumbing is leaking,
Someone left a faucet dripping
Or a toilet is stuck
And my home's organ pipes
play a sonata of loss…
Something that I overlooked …
Or that broke in the night.

Drip, drip, worry, worry
The water runs out and we die.

So I creep up to the attic in the dark
And crawl out onto the roof
And climb the ladder on the water tank
Moonlight reflects off of the pool of water
And, as I stare down at the silver surface,
My glowing computer screen tells me that we are fine.

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