This is when I miss Jerry Lewis most, seeing him exhausted,
the haze from the cigarette dangling from his mouth, reminding me of my life at
home with my uncles and the haze of cigarettes hanging from their mouths.
I walk beside the river and look over at the skyline and
that cluster of skyscrapers among which was one where the telethon took place,
recalling my Labor Day trips there, and my standing outside on the sidewalk
waiting for my group’s turn to go inside.
Now everything seems empty, someone else’s face where the
famous comedian’s once was, and I wonder at how we keep losing things we love,
how important pieces of our lives vanish, not appreciating them when they still
were here, love being the most terrible loss of all.
I stroll along the riverfront walkway at the bottom of the
cliffs, seeking out in this landscape for what was most recently lost, the
massive bulk of history hanging over me, the while house that leads to her street,
a forbidden zone I must avoid or come too close to, lost but not forgotten,
most acute at this end of season when all things begin to fade.
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