Poetry – Issue 8 | February 2010
Three Poems by Michael Bazzett
Old Man
The snow on the house is blue in the moonlight, the trees naked and black. He steps slowly along the pitched peak of the roof, one foot straddling either sloping side, until his trembling hand grasps the chimney and the wire of his posture goes slack.
His coat comes off, exposing sagging flesh. He has a slightly dented chest and roping white arms that circle back, his long fingers searching the hollow between his shoulder blades. He probes the folded place where his wings are furled.
They are not metaphor – just strange, tired flesh drawn into the cold. He unfolds them carefully, like a letter pulled from a rummage-sale couch. His back quakes as they extend creakily, muttering as his knees do in the morning, and he soundlessly spreads them to dry in the warm smell of wood smoke rising.
A million capillaries trace the map of flight. His overlarge heart diverts its dark flow to thicken the wings. His chest x-ray stunned the radiologist when he battled bronchitis last year, an astonishment that served as catalyst for an unfortunate chain of events.
The wings tug like a kite, now. They nose the air like a tethered pony. The old man wraps a scarf around his neck, then crisscrosses another over his torso.
When he drags himself into the impossibly clear night, heading south, it is still a surprise. He does not fly easily. Instead, he crawls upward, scrabbling and frog-kicking like a swimming boy.
About the author
Michael Bazzett spent the past year living with his wife and two children in the mountains of central Mexico; other addresses have included Paris, Dakar, and Minneapolis. His poems have recently appeared or are forthcoming in 32 Poems, Best New Poets 2008, The MacGuffin and Rattle. The winner of the 2008 Bechtel Prize from Teachers & Writers Collaborative, Michael finds nothing more charming than referring to himself in the third person.
Next in Poetry: Four poems by Mahogany L. Browne
Previously in Poetry: Travelling Long to Inform a Friend's Death
