Summer Camp

We drove long treks- indifference and back,

from the armpit of Florida’s Panhandle

to higher grounds in Tallahassee

He told me the day before, they’d met way back

in the early 19^th Century

halfway between Pensacola and St. Augustine

breaking ground on a capital city

Peeling off miles over marshy rivers,

with docks penetrating an easing flow,

past random houses on pilings

embedded within pine trees, solitary

across vacant lots, unsold

Solemn ritual, stopping to shed light on the mileage,

biscuits and gravy at a Hardee’s with senior coffee

and a flimsy plastic cup of water for the road,

exacting timing of the chemo pill 45 minutes before

the radiation treatment,

despite the fact we’d arrive an hour early

The waiting room of the cancer center

sitting watching the space before him dissolve with time,

somehow without a screen to burn his eyes,

before the calling back, before the mask directing

waves to the tumor shrouding the right side of his brain

to slow the malignancy

You asked me in hushed tones if I’d noticed anything unusual

in his movements, his quiet dignity

Pleasing October sun, the way home with tiny breezes drying air,

hints of autumn away from the Southern California heatwave

Unaware of my state’s impending secession,

you brought it to my attention after I mentioned

my civic pride to drive a hybrid

The personal connection to the lens

degrading my livelihood and passion,

much less the world around me

Stopping for lunch in a ramshackle building

nestled in whispering pines near water,

dirt in the parking lot, dusting up and stirring

the remains of the drive

Blackened gulf oysters on a bun with Louisiana hot sauce and iced tea

His glass of wine you didn’t want him to finish

Settling the differences between us when the check came

Matt Mauldin
11/2017
Santa Barbara, CA

First appearing in Event Horizon Magazine
https://eventhorizonmagazine.com/

Issue 3