WINTER 2006

 


Winter 2005-6



Howard Good

THE CONCIERGE OF HELL
My father, suddenly aged,
works ghostly sums in his head,
the number of houses on fire,
the number of bones in the casket.
Pills don’t seem to help;
whether face up or face down,
the cards leave the same puddles
of shadow on the table.
“Y is a crooked letter,” he says
to the man in the tailored suit
who radiates a strident bonhomie
like the concierge of hell.
The windows run with rain,
though the air itself is fiery dust.
I look up at the sound, using my finger,
tender where I nicked it yesterday
with a knife, to mark my place.


Howard Good, a journalism professor at SUNY New Paltz, is the author of the poetry chapbook, Death of the Frog Prince (FootHills Publishing, 2004). His poems have appeared in numerous journals and e-zines, including Right Hand Pointing, Stirring, Slow Trains, Plum Ruby Review, Wilmington Blues, The Rose & Thorn, 2River View, and Lily.

 
 

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