Please use this blog to help us remember Joshua Lee Anderson, who made the tragic and fatal decision to take his life on Wednesday, March 18, 2009. Please post any memories or thoughts you may have in the comments.


Saturday, August 18, 2012

Three Years and Five Months Later - August 18, 2012

I am off this weekend to move Gillian to NYC.  Too bad Josh were not here; he would enjoy a short weekend in the city, seeing his baby cousin and eating lunch at Katz - he loved their pastrami sandwiches

I want to share another poem from Billy Collins - it is actually the one that titles the collection.

Horoscopes for the Dead
by Billy Collins

Every morning since you disappeared for good, 
I read about you in the daily paper
along with the box scores, the weather, and all the bad news. 

Some days I am reminded that today
will not be a wildly romantic time for you,
nor will you be challenged by educational goals,
nor will you need to be circumspect at the workplace.

Another day, I learn that you should not miss
an opportunity to travel and make new friends
though you never cared much about either. 

I can't imagine you ever facing a new problem
with a positive attitude, but you will definitely not
be doing that, or anything like that, on this weekday in March.
And the same goes for the fun
you might have gotten from group activities,
a likelihood attributed to everyone under your sign.

A dramatic rise in income may be a reason
to treat yourself, but that would apply 
more to all the Pisces who are still alive,
still swimming up and down the stream of life
or suspended in a pool in the shade of an overhanging tree.

But you will be relieved to learn
that you no longer need to reflect carefully before acting,
nor do you have to think more of others,
and never again will creative work take a back seat
to the business responsibilities that you never really had.

And don't worry today or any day
about problems caused by your unwillingness
to interact rationally with your many associates.
No more goals for you, no more romance,
no more money or children, jobs or important tasks,
but then again, you were never thus encumbered.

So leave it up to me now
to plan carefully for success and the wealth it may bring,
to value the dear ones close to my heart,
and to welcome any intellectual stimulation that comes my way
though that sounds like a lot to get done on a Tuesday.

I am better off closing the newspaper,
putting on the clothes I wore yesterday
(when I read that your financial prospects were looking up)
then pushing off on my copper-colored bicycle
and pedaling along the shore road by the bay.

And you stay just as you are,
lying there in your beautiful blue suit,
your hands crossed on your chest
like the wings of a bird who has flown
in its strange migration not north or south
but straight up from earth
and pierced the enormous circle of the zodiac.

Josh - I wish you were still swimming in the "stream of life" with us and all your friends.  We miss you.   

1 comment:

GrahamForeverInMyHeart said...

I printed this poem for myself after reading your previous blog post about Billy Collins.
I know that you would happily give up everything to have Josh back, as would I to have my son back.
If only missing them and shedding tears would bring them back.
I'm thinking about you and Josh, but I wish that you didn't have to write this blog an that he were living his life in the real world.