“Reconstructionism” by Michael O’Brien

 

He was never one
for talking much.

For affection
he’d offer
a joke or two.

Then the stroke. Bro
ken sentence chunks unglued syn
tax poured from him
some
times laughing and I
smiling with his smile
some
times crying, and well…

Now empty of words.

I wish him
power of syntax
reconstructed

lithe words to
reinvent his life to speak
to his wife “love”

to boggle grandkids
with boy tales
unleashing brash verbs
upon Hutchinson, Kansas.

Then to play with words:
swing them and slide them
to monkey around bar
ring nothing
and slowly
uncover
his poetry

father
who’d read only
the paper
before.

 

 

Michael O’Brien has been writing and publishing his poetry for forty years. His poetry has been widely published, most recently in a college text book, California: Dreams and Realities, Vol. IV (Bedord/St. Martins).