Beating the Odds.
Beating the Odds by Lindsay Lewis
He thought they had covered eventualities
the small assurances of life
years of counting carbs and slathering sunscreem
petunias, seeding in spring
He thought he knew the texture of his life
wife at his fingertips
filling cups with coffee: Black, rich, dark.
He always dealt in answers, measured happiness with
yardstick precision
Now he shuffles questions
on unfamiliar ground: This why is not his
At night only the tick tick of clock arms
paddling nowhere
the weight of her absence pressing his body
deeper into the sheets
His body, a white flower in a book
someone had forgotten to open.
I wrote this poem as a tribute to a friend’s sister who died very young,in her forties, leaving a daughter and husband behind. Grief is a slippery, bottomless pit.