No uncertain terms

  

Simon & Garfunkel’s song Old Friends

Runs in my head as I listen

To the familiar voice of my childhood

Buddy on the phone,

Each of us touching bases

After a year apart (when

In former days we could not

Be parted for more than days)

Each of us full of the litany

Of age and life

The heart ache and the belly ache

And the pathetic politics

Of labor relations,

Catching up on the year’s news

Of what makes the world turn
the soap opera of people’s lives

That aren’t really ours

We mostly immune to the petty

Stuff that other people

Seem to feed on,

His voice like a the hefty beers

We used to get each Friday

After a hard day’s labor

Talking the pain out

Over the foam,

And even now,

After a year of mutual

Suffering apart

The liquor of his voice

Still works its magic

Telling me in no uncertain terms

We survived.