Mary Full Of Grace Poem by Robert Rorabeck

I caught myself dancing in the
Front seat of my pickup
Truck with aunt mary in
The passenger seat replacing
All the old ghosts, now
She’s one too, because
She’s been there at that
Lonely place beside me
On the bed she was talking
About making money and
All the various ways to
Pay off your debt; she does it
By selling produce in south florida;
She went on like an economist
My eyes journalists
Fell to their side to
Watch her tongue roll
Little bits of her children
Are on her cheeks, blond babies
They are her hope
Planted into this world
To take first tiny firm roots
Into the pots she’s planted
Them- they are her karate
Kicking security when she
Tells me how her husband john
Broke his finger today
Moving for her; she sounds
Excited about the break, and I
Don’t tell her about how
This Mexican loius who
Once worked at their fruit stand
Saw john frequently at the pool hall
With other women he frequents
I hear the truth in mary’s
Voice- she’s not dumb she
Knows about john but there
Are her kids and
house payments she still
Needs help on and
Most of all there’s that
Hungry maw of loneliness
That blows in the off
Season from the east
The hurricanes of her
Humid thoughts when she
Sits alone in the front
Of my truck’s rusting bed
She’s trying to catch me
To tell me something she’s trying
To whisper a kiss from 2
Feet into my ear or to
Reach over and touch her hungry
Painted nails to my knee to show
me she remembers
How we use to play
Doctors after seventh day
Adventist Saturday Sabbath
Behind the wooden pallets
Not far away from my defunct
Grandparents’ mobile home,
And that she passionately
Recalls the forts we put together
With Indian blankets over
Chairs arranged to let only
The light play into our secrecy-
How we’d then stomp the
Blankets between chairs tipping
Our houses over to make
A felty boat to sail
Out of the maudlin living
Rooms and into her Atari set;
But she knows that all those
Memories are sunk- she’s
Grown up to that responsibility
And I a lonely sailor am left
Adrift waiting for sharks to end it
When she asks me- so,
You figured out what to do yet? And
I try to assert my
Throat like some
Great capitalist investment
Thinker when I give
My excuses and on top
Of them that I’ve saved
Money and maybe next
Tuesday I’ll go fishing
To catch me a trout,
Mary pretends to
Understand all my
Wanderer ways;
Like her brother, she
Tells herself I just
Don’t want responsibility,
But deep down, like the
Rest of the family, she
Knows I have the love of
Jesus, which will one
Day bring me
To the bank- she’s
Still trying to touch me
In her mind, she’d touch
Anyone to keep from
Drowning- I wonder how
Long before she divorces
Herself into her children
And finds the long
Legs of a new love
Warming her in a strange sailing
Bed; she should know
I cannot help her,
All I am is secret
Mischief, a fallen Peter Pan
Thinking that all this light
Is the lure from carnival, and
When we reach our destination
At the dojo where her
Children are
Learning to combat
She thanks me
I thank her
She goes around the
Back of my truck to
Check the taillights
And gives me the
Go ahead to leave
There as I dropp her
Off back into her life
Without any kind of lifejacket.