Sadie and Pal, A Ballad

 Sadie and Pal, A Ballad

Sadie and Pal are dead now—
since November, more or less.
Which seems like a long time ago,
but grief has its own address.

Sad Cornelia.
Sad Connie.
No bears at Bear Mountain.
The Trailside Zoo is bear-less now,
which feels like poor accounting.

The heroes of my heart,
I like to think,
are not exactly gone.
They’ve slipped into another dimension
and carried the good stuff on.

Down some secret tunnel
beneath the mountain floor,
where bears have endless blueberries
and nobody asks for more.

Meanwhile, here I am,
with cholesterol,
with fat,
with the mysterious determination
of my body to attach it
to my belly and my hips.

But my heart is fine.

So, suck it up, Connie.

It’s not forever.

There will be bears again.

Eventually.

Once they upgrade the habitat
and presumably get the paperwork

and whatever else you need
to make a bear comfortable
in the modern world.

And then the names.

Oh, the names.

Sasquatch and Sam.
Palisade and Peek.
Sable and Spruce.
Hudson and Highlands.

Ramble and Ridge.
Picnic and Basket.

Actually—

Maybe the last two.

Picnic and Basket.

Tell me that isn't a pair of bears
who know exactly what they're doing.

But before we get there,
before the new bears arrive,
perhaps we could ask the visitors
to stop treating the park
like the landscape is indestructible.

Rest, people.

Let the mountain breathe.

Let the trails be trails.
Let the woods be woods.
Let the bears, when they return,
have something worth coming back to.

Sadie and Pal are gone.

The mountain remains.

And somewhere, I hope,
two enormous bears
are having an excellent afternoon
in another dimension—

probably eating berries,
probably ignoring us,

and absolutely
not worrying about their hips.

 

The Long Way Home

 The Long Way Home

Gina ran away one fall
On nothing but a dare,
The promised warmth of southern skies
Was waiting somewhere there.

They said that summer lingered on
Where ocean breezes roamed,
While winter gathered in the north
Around the streets of home.

"Bring swimsuits," somebody laughed,
"Bring sandals for the shore."
But Gina owned no clothes like that
A city girl to the core.

She was New York through and through,
Just sixteen, wild and bright,
And when she crossed a crowded room
She seemed to gather light.

Four girls cut class and hit the road
Instead of school that day,
Chasing freedom down the coast
And throwing rules away.

They thumbed their rides through Newark first,
Then farther south they went,
Living on the kindness found
Wherever fate had sent.

Gina prayed that Lucy would
Be home when trouble came,
For someone had to know the truth

Behind each borrowed name.

The stories spun to hide their tracks,
The lies they thought would last,
Could never stay ahead for long—
The truth rode hard and fast.

And where was Katya on that road?
Perhaps she wandered still,
Not running from the dark so much
As learning how to will

Her way through it.

Three days passed.
Baltimore at last.
A holding room.
A waiting gloom.

Detention walls and anxious hours,

Four runaways shut in,
Till someone called and someone came
To gather them again.

Lucy did what Lucy could,
Steady, wise, and kind.
She gave the look grown women give
When worry fills the mind.

And had it ended otherwise,
Had fate not stepped in then,
Gina never would have met
The man she'd meet again.

But that comes later.

Back then they rode
Like concert kids at play,
Certain they could leave the world
And simply drift away.

As though four girls could disappear
For just a weekend's roam,
Then call for help when funds ran low
And find an easy home.

As though a parent, scout leader,
Or some patient soul could come,
To claim them from the road they chose
And drive them northward home.

Back through miles of autumn rain,
Past every mile they'd flown,

To face the thing all runaways
Must someday learn and own:

No matter how far south you go,
No matter where you roam,
The longest road a runaway walks
It's the long way home.