Questions about Schizophrenia

BRIAN CRONWALL

                                    —for my birth father Haakon

                      1.

I close the door before I begin this poem.

The questions I want to ask, Haakon,

should not be interrupted.

At first, was it like slivers of a broken mirror

or more like spilled maple syrup dripping to the floor?

When did you first know

the movies you watched were not the same

as your father’s or sisters’

but closer to your involuntarily committed mother’s?

When you boxed Golden Gloves,

could you see the bell’s sound?

In the merchant marines,

did you roll with the swells or

watch circus animals in the wake?

Did the strawberries or heads of lettuce 

you picked in Watsonville speak of the necessity to scream?

2.

Tires screech on the road outside.

I shut the window, pull the drapes.

All those years you never talk about,

are those memories in an iron filing cabinet

in storage, or are they perhaps ashes

mixed with seawater or dry clay?

Can you tell me one meal from then?

One rain drop?  Would you rather not?

3.

Breathing deeply, I stare

at the empty plaster wall.

 

When you re-entered our imperfect world,

was it like leaving an after-hours bar

at sunrise, a mangy dog nearby

growling and wagging its tail at the same time?

Or more like the end of the Matterhorn ride at Disneyland:

light, a splash, the bar across the seat lifted,

a step onto solid ground?

What did you hear first?

Did they tell you the names and effects of the meds,

or did you earn that experience

like sawdust-covered paychecks at a lumber mill?

4.

I write these questions, Haakon,

because I cannot ask them.

There are gifts in the years we’ve had,

in the years we never had.

If I could sweep up the broken glass,

wipe up the syrup,

hold your hand while we watch

the high-wire artist flip, near-miss,

then find footing right after

the audience gasp,

I would do it.

Can you tell me again

about swimming after school in the bay,

the prostitutes in Yokohama,

when your parents came from Norway,

your pants size, how you met my mother?

I pull the drapes and open the window.

In the new light, I hear a knock at the door.

Father, will you answer it with me?

• • •

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