Chester Alan Arthur

looks down on me with pity--
where once he presided
over your wild spins
on the tire swing,
he now casts his bronze gaze upon
the wreckage of my motherhood.

Your brother
my only living child
asked me if I were afraid of death
Not my own I said
and couldn't add: but yours.

Je pense en francais
en francais
je ne sais
que tu as passee.

Memere, je me souviens
le jour qu'elle me regarda
et pleura,
tu parle francais!
from the pearly horizon of her own death
she mistook me for a childhood friend--
c'est trop loin, ce pays la.