Milton Jordan
But for table talk we were not unlike
our ordinary neighbors, the middle
of the middle class, cathedral Philco
or Motorola radios, black and white
television sets in a few houses
with standup trays to serve as meal tables.
We, though. were long without television
and Father dressed for dinner, his shirt
glare white, a dark tie knotted four-in-hand
expecting the four of us on time,
equally well dressed, attentive to stories
of his day and ready with our own.
The four of us, now far scattered, gathered
outside Ozona once more last summer
Sitting around Doc’s well scarred table,
gravy grown cold on our plates and long necked
brown bottles filling empty spaces,
surprised when Sarah said she’d seen two
volumes of his Collected Stories
still shelved at the Heights Branch Library.
Milton Jordan lives with photographer Anne Elton Jordan in Georgetown, Texas. His most recent poetry collection, A Forest for the Trees, is out from Backroom Window Press. He co-edited the anthology Lone Star Poetry, poems from Texas Poetry Assignment for Kallisto Gaia Press.