HIS APPEAL

HIS APPEAL

 

I wake up and wonder how I would spend my day.

 --The widower, a retired Presiding Justice of the Court of Appeals
 

For Choy* and Emily Vasquez, Life Friends

What appeal is available for me? She’s gone ahead,

and I find my mornings difficult to even understand,
let alone plan. She knew the best stripes for my tie. 

Presiding over the fates of men and empires was easy

Enough to sleep through when nights were angry
Snarls against shadows jumping tall to shape a world  

Beyond his ken, beyond his tolerance, an unforgiving

Mélange of smallness and disregard for simple courage
When that is all one needs to make sense of a brief 

Dance of clowns on the circus square wheedling smirks

As the flyers climb slack ropes for an act of deviltry,
An uncanny illusion of what must be done to look alive. 

I look out of sills to find grass suffocating her roses,

and  ask where she kept her trowel so I could do her
gardening while she takes her time to come home. 

If only I could remember where I tucked my slippers,

or get someone to answer my appeal for an answer,
I would be out there in the sun pruning her flowers. 

---Albert B. Casuga

05-30-12 , at Almanza Metropolis
 

*Retired Philippine Court of Appeals Presiding Justice Conrado Vasquez Jr., and recently deceased wife Emily Gonzalez, dearest friends of fond remembrances.