Prognosis Poem by Will Thomas

(for my children, and for all my friends on shore)

Forty-nine days later,
after his wife
-operatically and quite literally-
in the desolate 4 a.m.-ness of a bleak November morning,
walked out
on him, a fifteen-year marriage, and a foolish gray cat
(antiseptic words of 'feelings for someone else' trailing after her,
searing snapshots of betrayals and manipulations
washing over him,
a spiraling descent,
hell beyond flame or forgiveness) :

Forty-nine days later,
faint and flickering indications of a pulse:
the first 24 hours without tears,
ragged sobbing,
primal screaming on hands and knees.

And today,
scarcely a week or so beyond
that timid shadow of a victory,
this piecemeal poet,
teacher of history, literature (irony, symbol) ,
rescued three or four Christmas ornaments
from the 75%-off table at the local Pier One-
not at all the intent of this mid-January outing,
but they caught (his heart) his eye.

Hours later,
while he vacuumed the family room carpet,
the thought began to find its shape:
leftover ornaments,
a holiday almost 12 months away,
an unintentioned nod to a future
where he might find a place.

A 57-year-old man,
famished, of late, for death
(clumsy, pathetic,
and ultimately aborted footfalls in that direction:
garage exhaust,
a belt in the basement eaves on the night before Christmas,
a colorfully lethal trail mix of three different anti-depressants) :

This man,
it turns out,
is going to live.

And, yes,
(tucked away on a bitter and chill January eventide,
awaiting the swaddling darkness,
the healing dance of candlelight) ,

this man,
now sitting up
and taking nourishment,

this man,
this man
wants
to
live.