Page 19 - C.A.L.L. #47 - Winter 2020/2021

Communal Living

By Alice Jones

When we were young and immortal

what would we have said,

if an angel had come down

to our shack in Oregon's green

hills, as we warmed ourselves

beside the woodstove in a dark

soot-laden dawn, waiting for

Enid to make a pot of oatmeal,

Wayne to chop more wood;

if she waded her way among the piles

duffel bags, the psychedelic

watercolors, the cans of Bugler,

packs of Camels with rising suns,
She would furl her wings, point and
waves of color and stars drawn on,
say--you, dead at 23, a suicide; you,
found us in overalls and hiking boots,

medical school; you, a life of loss and
our long cotton paisley skirts,
unemployment; you, a mother, activist
hair down past the waist, our manes
in Vermont; you, filmmaker in Russia;
blowing in the smoky early morning
you, one year of law school, one son,
as we rolled our first cigarettes
then dead at 40, an unnamed virus.
or weed, maybe someone put on The Band,
Would we have tilted back our
Jackie Lomax or Fresh Cream.
uncombed heads and laughed?

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