Tom Sheehan

A VOICE TOUCHING

A drunk startles me
from a doorway.
He cries against
his mother’s arms,
into darkness
and nothing of daylight,
which has gone like a thief
over the stonewall at street’s end.
His wail vibrates
slowly off the curbstone,
goes cold, curb-gray,
weak as a river
out of sight
under thick alders.
He is not alone despite
all this loneliness,
this cold street,
September touching pavement,
Saturday touching
Sunday, acceptance,
being what you are
and where you’re supposed to be.

I keep seeing
the dark doorman
stashed in his cubicle,
shaded, ragged, dreaming
of the door opening, light
spilling on his hands,
night flaking its pieces
from his soft shoes,
a voice touching
where his mouth went.

Date of Birth: 1928 Location: Boston, Massachusettes Email: tomsheehan@attbi.com Website: http://home.attbi.com/~tomsheehan/ Publications: Paumanok Review, Literary Potpourri, Clackamas Literary Review, Carnelian, Samsara, AJoP, Comrades, Slow Trains, 3am Magazine, Dakota House Journal, Small Spiral Note-book, Red River Review, Stirring V3:E7, V3:E8, V4:E1, etc. Awards: 2001 Silver Rose Award for Excellence of the Short Story, First Prize Eastoftheweb non-fiction competition, Nominee for Pushcart Prize XXVII and inclusion in The Zine Yearbook.

- May 2002 - Memory Selection Little Mother Lust for Light Lines when we moved back here Valentine (Funny how we assumed) Leaving Left The Equation The Revenge Julia Letter to my Sister A Voice Touching In Miniature Smog - Erin Elizabeth's Favorite Six - For Gala-Salvador Dali For our dead cat . . . A Poem to My Left Breast Sadie and jamie wouldn't eat her dinner. Scratching A Sound From My Throat, Waiting For The Room To Clear