Poem about Macy

Melanie Uttech took this picture at the Hessler Street Fair last year.....it was the last street fair there will ever be.


poem about macy macy (on the first day of school)
By Markk

i drop macy off on the first day of school.
she looks over where the tree used to be.
i’m still mad they cut down that tree, she says,
but she smiles again,
for it is the first day of school.


i hear the bright lines
of a grateful dead song:
“ah, child of countless trees,
ah, child of boundless seas.”

she dances down the driveway
& dances right back. asks me to
make her spaghetti (just butter,
no sauce). tells me there is a
spider in bathroom, begs me to
take it outside, not kill it. wonders
out loud if she would like it in
new york, tells me she’s mad that
mira gets to go to the movies & not her.

macy talks about skunks like
they are her pets. calls them
her “fellow friends.” sits for
an hour practicing a cello
in squeaks & melodious notes
without ever having a lesson.

macy –

asks me to help her find her shoes,
her ipod, her pencil case, loses
everything, cries, and finds it again.
cries when her guinea pig needs more food,
laughs like a maniac about a line
in some song. cries when she sees
a homeless man on cleveland’s
bleak streets, laughs again when
she sees the face of a tiny dog.

macy & cassie take pictures
of each other, backflips on the
lawn, making ridiculous faces,
hanging upside down from
the swing set. they sit in the
grass, planning to save all the
animals, & i’m certain they will.

it is the first day of school. macy races
up the sidewalk, always looks back &
waves a second time just to be sure.

macy calls me on my cell phone
as i sit in a hotel near chicago,
tells me i have to get carry out
for dinner, & eat it in the room,
because it makes her sad to think
of me in a restaurant eating alone.

macy says if she meets george bush
she will tell him a thing or two.

a family of five & macy is the conscience,
in many ways, she is older than anyone,
an indigo child in a world of dark shadows.

all five of us in the car heading off
somewhere. macy is barefoot, says
she doesn’t need to wear shoes.

but she wears her dance shoes
tight on her feet, dressed in taffeta
& lace, smiling as the song comes to
end, smiling with wide eyes. all of
the animals are there in front row,
& clap their paws with a beautiful thud.

first day of school & the world belongs to macy