Coffee Line

I see her leaning over to listen to her daughter
In the coffee line.

It is a rainy day in spring
Months after he died.

He dies alone in one part of the house
Her singing and dancing in another.

Hours pass while she believes
She is not alone.

Why does she going looking for him?
A feeling or just habit?

Just time to get dinner started, pick up the kids
Vacuum the carpet, go shopping.

We are all alone all the time
We just tend to assume otherwise.

The Game

He loved going to the football games with his dad.
Driving some convoluted back way to avoid the traffic.
Finding some magical parking spot near an alley.

He loved playing golf with the old man.
Mostly quiet walks along the fairways.
One time they played behind Obama.

His dad was not warm in the traditional sense.
But he raised him without a mother.
He worked all the time.

The duty to write an obituary fell on him, not his sister.
He relished the chance to go over the memories.
The recent ones, mostly.

They had become closer as the father got old.
Softened a bit at the edges.
As life tends to do.