Chapin City Blues

The way I while away the hours of a day 
listening for their voices, 
the sounds of their laughter 
echoing so far in the hereafter 
that I think of entertaining the idea 
that I may – one day – see them again, 
or that they’re still out there 
laughing in another room 
in another house not quite our own 
but close enough that they moved in by accident. 

A tradition I broke last year was no publishing something I wrote as the final poem. I tried to keep up with that, but the well began to run dry. I felt unmotivated to write. Perhaps it was depression, which is ironic as that it was depression that led me to writing. Still, I did manage to produce on poem I was proud of last year, a poem that I submitted to the aforementioned anthology, I Love Use: Queer Voices from South Texas and the Borderlands. Maybe my “Walkman” poem will appear in next year’s celebration with a link to the book. 

 “after ‘Gravedigger’ by Dave Matthews” was work that took me years to write, beginning with a blog post on 18 November 2010. Two tragic events happened in my life between then and the (semi) completion of the poem. Those tragedies are the loss of my friends (though, they were family) in a 2018 car accident where my son’s mother was the sole survivor, and the passing of my own father the following summer. When I revisited the poem again, it was shortly after the passing of my last living grandparent. As it stands, “after ‘Gravedigger’ by Dave Matthews” has been undergoing revision after revision for the last 15 years. There are too many people I have lost to ignore, though I do not know how to include them in this poem. And I really wish I could.  

Most recently, another tragedy has occurred in my world. This one belonging to my loved ones more so than my own. It is never easy saying goodbye to a loved one and even less so when that loved on still had so many years to give this world. I have never lost someone so young before, save for my friend Teddy when we were both in high school. I can only imagine the ache that brings and wish there was a way to heal those affected by it.  

Perhaps “after ‘Gravedigger’ by Dave Matthews” will earn a few more verses, add in a few more names. Perhaps it will grow into another poem altogether, one with a proper title. Or maybe this poem has reached its limit, and a new one will be birthed. Either way, I will end this as I have ended all the other poems in this year’s celebration. 

Guillermo Corona is a poem from the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas. He is currently a graduate student in Mexican American Studies and the Gender & Women Studies programs. He dabbles in fiction and poetry, book reviews, and commentary. He has worked in the library world for 12 years and is currently working in the special collections and archives department after “graduating” from a children’s library.