Thomas Locicero’s most recent poem to appear here was “A Poet is Not a Priest” (October 2019).
My Uncle Joe Died Today
By Thomas Locicero
By Thomas Locicero
We are still quarantined. The two thousandth
American died only three days after
The one thousandth. My Uncle Joe died today.
But he had been dying for more than a year.
He knew nothing of this virus, only
The names of his sons. Perhaps, he was blessed.
At my father’s funeral, he had told me
Stories about my storytelling father,
About the two torpedoed ships, the sharks,
How my father never saw a blue ocean
Again, about Okinawa and the words
“Fixed bayonets” and the hand-to-hand combat
In the cave from which my father emerged,
His eye permanently damaged, and I
Foolishly asked, “What happened?” “What do you think
Happened? Your father came home, didn’t he?”
Did he? Uncle Joe helped me understand
A man I had never known. Now I knew why.
We celebrated my father that day.
Now, today, there is no celebrating
Uncle Joe. No service, no minister,
No gathering to tell stories about him.
Only a quick, discreet, anonymous
Burial, like that of a rat or pauper.
And when this ends—and it will—when we should
Be celebrating, we will begin to mourn.
This is just lovely. I keep coming back to read it.