Subject: About Greg

He played the mandolin

but his primary instrument was conversation.

Many nights we were the last ones awake,

still riffing and ranting glassy eyed

New York style repartee

outraged and amazed

by everything

including the empty moonlit street.

It was after all Syracuse

in 1975 no less

and rather than implode

he lived to a frenetic blue grass beat

and talked into the nights

and when words made no sense

music did.

Email subject: About Greg

In a hospital near Baltimore

one side paralyzed by stroke

he is hoping to recover focusing the energy

amazed and outraged

by everything

including me

calling him after thirty years.

My fingers don’t remember mandolin

he says

but people learn.

I’m resolute.

(Resolute. That’s the word he uses.)

Know what else?

I can hear the cicadas.

So strange.

I’ve waited for this.

And I hear them.