Belief

Last year was the last year

my son let me believe that he believed

in Santa Claus. We suspected he'd known.

He's a smart kid, logical, and wouldn't

be bullshitted for long. The real disappointment

is his disappointment that we are all complicit

in perpetuating this ruse. After all,

if we'd lie about this, what else is a lie?

Religion? Democracy? the promise that you can 

be whatever you want to be when you grow up?

We got a live tree again this year, a Fraser fir

that smells like a childhood Christmas.

My son and I set up the model train

encircling the trunk. I'm not sure

his heart was in it. Perhaps he's still 

disenchanted, I thought, as he raised the lever 

bringing the small locomotive to life.

Then he blew the whistle and smiled at me,

his face illuminated by strings of lights,

a glowing star high above.  Belief, or not

it will soon be Christmas morning.

Ride Along

An Oven Algorithm

She is having her new oven delivered today,
and confides that it is an exciting, if not
emotional time.  She has spent 50 years
with the old one and fears she may cry
when they finally take it away.

I have never owned an oven, or anything
for that matter, for 50 years.  Despite that,
I try to sound sympathetic and empathize,
even though I find it difficult to wrap my mind
around a relationship of that length.

As the phone goes quiet for a moment,
I wonder if there is an algorithm
to determine the average bowls of soup, or
pierogies prepared by a Polish grandmother
over the lifespan of her oven.

She and I simply have a different measure
of time.  She is able to use major appliances
in her calculation.  I will need another 50 years
to understand loss to the degree at which
she has experienced it.