Henryland now

Waiting for Henryland now.
Piano jazz on the family iPod.
Knowing he might walk in
sometime within this very sentence.

Or this one.

…No, not yet, but soon.

Henryland: a funfair
for middle-aged war vets.
I know shortcuts to the sweetest rides,
I know the thrillingest car
on the stroller coaster.
Total access, free chili dogs,
an all-night ticket. No lines,
no crowd. Just my husband, me,
and Oscar Peterson.

Henryland: my latter-day
reward for taking all those classes.
(This thesis took me
thirty years to write.)

Henryland: my recompense.

And in the yard a gallery
of rusted iron: the broken ones.
We don’t ride those anymore.
(People kept getting killed.)
We should haul them to the dump,
I know, but we’re lazy, and, besides,
they’re cenotaphs. They’re modern art.

Someday I’ll write a poem called ‘How
to Love Someone,’ but this might do, for now.