The Affair-
Harry was a crazy son of a bitch
he’d start every sentence with
“Not that I’d give a fuck what you think, but”
he lost a leg in Vietnam
then a child ten years later
some say he was a loving man once
now he’s never not on pills
or coke or booze or tirades
and punching walls
and knocking his wife clear across the room
as if she didn’t lose plenty in all of this too
I heard he died this morning
and all I could think was ‘it’s over,
thank god it’s over’
I drove on out to the house
and handed his old lady a bottle of whiskey
we smoked cigarettes on the front porch
in utter silence
as the rain started to fall hard
on this cursed earth
“Well, that’s that” she says
we stand a while longer not saying nothing
until the wind
takes the rain and sends it heavy into our faces
then we head on inside
to finish what we started thirty some odd years ago.