Poetry by Lana Hechtman Ayers
breath of ginger, cardamom, peppermint,
a special holiday blend of ice cream we spoon up
for breakfast, watching Saturday morning cartoons
and movies where fire-mouthed Godzilla tramples Tokyo,
then foils three-headed winged Ghidorah, his fiercest
opponent, and being Jewish, I don’t know what Christmas
means, or the word grace, or which monsters are real.
For years, brother, you instruct me in the fantastical
ways of Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica,
Buck Rogers and Doctor Who, and it’s all such fun,
good guys winning in the end, but when you introduce me
to reruns of Outer Limits and The Twilight Zone we grow
up in a world where the space shuttle explodes before our eyes
and the twin towers go up in flames with no aliens to blame—
only human hubris and brutality. This week, I rode in a hot air
balloon and witnessed the curvature of earth, the edge of all we are,
and nearly tumbled out over the realization of how beautiful
life could be if only we would cease battling one other, brother.
[Author Note: This poem begins with a line from Patricia Fargnoli’s “Winter Sky Over Cheshire County, New Hampshire” and is dedicated to my brother Alan.]
Lana Hechtman Ayers shepherded over 150 poetry collections into print in her role as managing editor for three small presses. She lives in Oregon on the unceded lands of the Yaqo’n people, where on clear, quiet nights she can hear the Pacific ocean whispering to the moon.
