sparrow singing, image by Amy Spielmaker, on Pixabay, modified
September 16, 1962
Down the dusty road without you,
down the dirty years and through the hall
of broken dreams, alone; (fallen on
of thieves, the both of us, fallen on of a thief);
no way to tell it, no way to say,
to speak, the void; no words to declare
what of mine and yours was lost
that day; that day
when the heavens fell.
*
Song Sparrow
Perched on a single, swaying reed,
you heard more than
the April wind howling through the cottonwoods,
more than the roar of the spring river,
more than the red-tailed hawk crying for meat;
heard more, in short, than we heard;
hitched up your larynx,
threw back your head,
and pelted the vast heaven with a prelude to kingdom euphony;
while we, deafened by pain and grief,
miasmic, oblivious,
could as well have been in the Bronx.
Keep singing, prophet.
Don’t mind us—you’re doing good work.
Please—
keep singing!
__________________
Charles Eggerth shares that his introduction to life came on September 16, 1962,
when he was just shy of ten years old: “My dad died in an airplane crash, leaving
my mother with seven children and an eighth one a month on the way. We were
living in southeastern Minnesota in a drafty old farmhouse where the indoor winter temperatures got as low as 35 degrees Fahrenheit. What to do?
“God had provided. Eight months earlier, my dad had taken out an eight-thousand-
dollar life insurance policy with a double indemnity rider in case he died in an
accident. The total amount for buying a house in town and paying off all the old
debts, including a rather large one at the Farmer's Cooperative Elevator? Sixteen
thousand dollars. God takes care of things.”
February 2025 issue
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