Review

10.

He is born in a simple time in a simple place. It is never certain who the father is and his mother will never let him forget this. It is the year when a man sings on film and a single plane will cross the Atlantic for the first time. He will want to escape and find his own voice. This may take a while.

9.

“The bruises were still there, even as an adult.” This is what my mother will say to me about his childhood. That unknown grandmother will leave him with the seen and unseen marks. There is no way to tell if he is able to share this pain with anyone he knew. Right in the body, following him “even as an adult”.

8.

Names do matter. As a casual break, my mother tells me that he had to choose his name. This was for the family and there were two choices. He could have had a saint’s name (a canonized title). Instead, it is a reference to a writer who found his true voice discussing life on an island with a strange presence (he never read it).

7.

On a carved piece of wood, shaped like the island itself, a photo of an oil rig is centred in Curaçao. This island, a part of three in an ABC pattern, has a floating bridge (pontoon) and Dutch architecture in the homes and streets. An oil company will also play its own part, giving my father work that will take him out of his home, give him another language, and the influence of money. In many years, that influence will be mentioned, lost and formed into a vague thought after a boy has listened to a lawyer in a quiet office. The carved wood – painted, mapped and lacquered – is still there, with some place in the home keeping it safe.

6.

This is the great mystery of their lives. How do people meet? He was with his oil rig, his work, his other women without a ring; she was young, on another island, without a degree and willing to escape with him. This is not to say that they should have separated and taken separate chances for themselves and the ones to come. It is still the “how” of it that remains; the note that is not played. Nothing ever revealed to me.

5.

She mentioned violence. This was public and in a crowd. There was a history there because of other histories that were too well-known to ignore. Those same islands were full of their own pain. And who was the target? What was the cause? Nothing revealed…

4.

It is me. A very small child at an airport with my brother and mother flanking me. It is me. A balcony belonging to godparents; me drawn up into a folding chair, examining myself. It is me. Department store studio photo close up with my brother smiling and my infant confusion. And it is me here, held by my father, all tuxedoed with his seventies hair and lapels. I am again between the sentries of my mother and brother. I am looking away from the camera. At such an age, I did not understand the duty of performance. Was it a wedding? A dinner? Someone’s unseen funeral? I am not in one last picture: mother and father dressed quite well, hands unheld.

3.

The following books were discovered in his collection:

• Mao’s Little Red Book
• Funk & Wagnells’ A Standard Dictionary of the English Language
• Atlas (all lines now redrawn)
• Workers of the World, Unite!
• Adolph Hitler (Biography)

His mind went out to strive for something, anything… Which way went untravelled? Among his tools, many years after, I find a large wrench. A faint swastika is a scratch of intent on its silver arm. As a child, I chose the atlas and dictionary. I wanted to seek, not to label.

2.

Here I am, the disappointment. Bad and fearful on the soccer field (no comment on this), a very bad balancing act on my bike (no word to the one with cuts and bruises after the training in the park). Can’t eat my food quietly. Can’t dodge an arm in its own orbit. Can’t take being shaken violently or beaten across the head without a trace of blood by the ear (blamed myself before any other questions were asked). Can’t take being scared. Again, not a comment on my disappointment. Just the acts themselves and the faint memory of a mumbled voice that is drifting down the hallway. There is where the disappointment grows and lives (here I am).

1.

The best way to deal with a loss is to make it a way of life. I was with relatives when my mother spoke to them by phone (no sound of her voice then). There were tears, the pain, and television. Even the season became one with that moment (celebration of a new life after an old life leaves; a few days early for this). There were many services; a priest who spoke to me with no English; a walk past a mausoleum wall with plaques in concrete and metal; the last trip taken to those islands. There is its own order in those moments, adding what is unseen to these words as I make my final thoughts, here at night with his life and my memories ringed around me.

*

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You can find more poems, stories, and articles by Kendall Defoe on my Vocal profile. I complain, argue, provoke and create...just like everybody else.

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