top of page

POEMOGRAPHY | 2025

Poems by R.M. Usatinsky

pōəˈmäɡrəfē, noun: form or process of writing and representing poetry

MARCH

01MAR25 | THE CALL IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT

 

I’d waited a lifetime for it, dreaded it,

hoped it would never come, but death

is inevitable; so when the phone rang

just after two a.m. and  mom’s name

 

appeared on the screen of my phone,

I knew that this was the call in the

middle of the night, the one I knew

would come one day; I had called my

 

mother just hours before, she said dad

was a having a bad day, that he couldn’t

breathe and the nurse had called for an

emergency delivery of oxygen; she said

 

try talking to your father, so I did, I said

hi dad it’s me, Ricky, and as he stared into

the screen I knew it would be the last time

I ever saw him alive, and indeed it was

02MAR25 | STUCK IN A RUT

 

I suppose you could say that I’m stuck,

a little stuck in a little rut; stuck in a little

rut with my big fat gut; stuck in a little rut

with my big fat gut eating a nut; stuck in a

 

little rut with my big fat gut eating a nut

contemplating getting a crewcut; then I’d

be stuck in a little rut with my big fat gut

eating a nut with a crewcut; and to celebrate

 

my crewcut I’d go and buy a donut, a cream-

filled donut for my big fat gut to celebrate my

crewcut and for being stuck in a little rut while

eating a nut; and with my donut in my big fat

 

gut, I’ll go and find a hut and dig myself a little

rut where I’ll sit on my butt and eat a nut while

looking at my crewcut wondering why oh why

I’ve got a big fat gut and such a tiny little butt

03MAR25 |  A PORCUPINE SKIT

 

Someone’s gotta dress up as the

porcupine when you’re doing a

porcupine skit; a child or small

person to don the costume and

 

suffer through the long process

of placing the quills in just the

right places; come to think of it,

I’m reminded about the time my

 

son was learning how to say the

word porcupine in Spanish; he

had a time saying puercoespín,

which literally means spiny pig;

 

he would say cuerpoespín, the

literal translation meaning spiny

body which, to me anyway, seems

like an even better way to say it

04MAR25 |  MAYBE

 

Maybe life doesn’t want me

hangin' around no more; not

making a fuss or going from

one thing to the next; sitting

 

too much, standing too much,

eating too much, sleeping too

much, not sleeping enough; I

wonder how much more I’ll

 

have to endure before the truth

is revealed, before they have to

cut me open and have the whole

thing blow up in their faces; I

 

used to think I was worthy of a

dignified, peaceful end, but now

I’m reminded that the end is still

the end no matter how much fuss

05MAR25 |  ASHES TO ASHES

 

The idea doesn’t sit well with me;

your body, already emaciated and

just barely recognizable, lying on

some slab in a refrigerated box in

 

the backroom or basement of the

place where they took you a few

hours after you breathed that last

breath in the presence of your son

 

and wife; where they removed you

with such care and dignity, draped

with the American flag and taken

down in the elevator to a waiting

 

vehicle; but the image of you being

placed into the cremator, the flames

engulfing your already ravaged body,

is too much for my imagination to bear

06MAR25 |  WHAT IS LOSS?

 

Loss is many things, not one thing

or another; it is the permanent loss

of a parent who dies, leaving behind

loved ones and memories and loss

 

for those who are left in the wake of

loss; loss is estrangement, when a son

or daughter discard a parent without a

trace of compassion, without a why or

 

explanation; loss is a brother who won’t

reach out though he continues a faraway

admiration but for some reason simply

can’t bring himself to calling and only

 

sends off brief updates when their mother

(not their father) is unwell, hospitalized,

or in some other peril; loss is an endless

void, an abyss of what will never be again

07MAR25 |  NASIRA

 

You are serenity, slowly moving ripples

that caress my spirit in those few fleeting

moments we share; but I wonder what

you see when you look at me, look into

 

my eyes; and what you feel when I tell

you my stories, woes and longwinded

anecdotes about my children who won’t

speak to me or my belly who speaks too

 

loudly or my past that lives too deeply

within me; what do you make of this old,

broken man? do you think he can be fixed?

do you really think I have the power to fix

 

myself? I left you today and went to buy

some eggs and other foods then walked to

the Vliet and looked at the water, trees, sky,

and birds; and I thought of you thinking of me

08MAR25 |  THE MOON (AS A DAYTIME SPECTACLE)

 

It’s only two o’clock in the afternoon,

the sun illuminates the pale blue sky

as a gentle breeze slowly moves the

newly sprouted greenery on the trees

 

across the canal; and from my window

vantagepoint I can clearly see the moon

in its waxing gibbous splendor floating

high above the tree tops (I have to adjust

 

my eyes to make sure it’s the moon and

not a pale smudge of birdshit the window

washer might have missed last week when

his extendible hose/brush slammed into

 

the window and scared me half to death);

I look at the moon as a daytime spectacle,

a thing I know is there but shouldn’t be, at

least not seen in the brightness of daylight

09MAR25 |  DREAMS INSIDE OF DREAMS

 

I love having dreams inside of other dreams,

especially when they’re set in Chicago; in last

night’s dream I was heading down deep into the

bowels of the subway; seeing the down escalator

 

was out of service, I decided halfway down to try

sliding the rest of the way and it was the most fun,

exhilarating experience, like an amusement park ride,

and once I reached the bottom of the long escalator, I

 

was overcome by a fit of giggles; noticing there were

options for both busses and L trains, I boarded a bus

towards home; just after the bus pulled out of the depot,

I spotted an older African American woman I knew

 

riding a bike, so I got off the bus to greet her but lost

track of her; in the second dreamscape, I recounted the

dream to my family at the dinner table telling them I had

taken the Peterson Avenue bus home before waking up

10MAR25 |  CURIOSITY KILLED THE CAT

 

I’ve always been one with a curious nature,

wondering how things work (like photocopy

machines, moonlight, and how famous rock

stars get paid); I was hoping to have been a

 

rock star myself to see firsthand how the money

gets from point A (radio stations, record stores,

streaming services, etc.) to Point B (the artist’s

bank account); so much bookkeeping and so

 

much money passing through so many hands, it

seems mindboggling really; but my curiosity of

late has been of a more consequential matter in

that it concerns a particular medication I’ve been

 

taking—Amlodipine—for the treatment of high

blood pressure, which I stopped taking a few days

ago as it was making me sick; now my curiosity

is focused on how that decision will play out

11MAR25 |  YOU NEVER FORGET

 

I pulled my bike out of the basement

this morning for the first time in two

years, dusted it off and walked it over

to the bike shop I’ve been using for

 

minor repairs and spring tune-ups; the

Turkish owner greeted me and took

the bike from me then gave it a once

over and squeezed the back tire telling

 

me it would be ready at three; I haven’t

been on a bike in a long time, not since

hurting my back while riding over some

uneven pavements on my way back to

 

the amusement park where we’d been

spending the weekend when I went home,

albeit briefly, to feed the cat and clean her

litterbox; you never forget how to ride a bike

12MAR25 |  DUST TO DUST

 

Mom called to tell me that the

thing has been done (funny I

can’t seem to bring myself to

say the word) and that her and

 

my brother will be bringing dad

home later today; what a strange

thing to say, I thought to myself,

he’s not actually coming home;

 

and I know it’s a euphemism and

I know it’s meant simply to soften

the harsh reality, but I think it’s

better to say what it is, but I guess

 

everyone has their own way of

dealing with grief and finding

ways of seeking comfort during

a time of such profound loss

13MAR25 |  LONG SHADOWS

 

I had been out for a midday stroll,

my body casting long shadows on

the well-worn pavement, when all

at once a sun shower swept in and

 

dowsed me with a light sprinkling

of rain; but with the rain, I noticed

that my shadow had suddenly gone,

vanished into thin air; I wondered if,

 

for those few fleeting seconds of time,

my soul had departed my body; and

then, in an instant, it returned as if it

had been to some otherworldly place,

 

returning again to whence it came, in

me, filling the void it left when the rain

appeared and doused my shadow with

its dewy mist and fine stinging spray

14MAR25 |  MY MOST HARROWING FEARS

 

As I head swiftly into old age, I am beginning

to amass a collection of what I call harrowing

fears, fears which have very little basis in any

genuine reality other than obsessions about this

 

or that and things that are very unlikely to occur;

no, it’s not what you’re thinking: coronary artery

disease, cancer, dementia––not that those don’t

cross my mind every now and again (okay, so

 

maybe more than that)––but truly outrageous and

nonsensical things like, for example, my fear of

being bludgeoned to death, either while riding on

on a city tram and being attacked by a lunatic with

 

a hammer, or someone bashing my head in with a

sledge-hammer while I’m listening to my meditation

on a bench on the banks of the waterway; I also fear

people randomly falling to their death from the sky

15MAR25 |  NEW BUSSES

 

The new busses that arrived in 2023

have finally been put into service; I

suppose that’s not earthshattering news,

but for me—especially because there’s

 

at least one new bus on my beloved 23

line—it’s something I’ve been waiting

for; the first one I spotted (just steps from

my house) was about a week or ten days

 

ago and I still haven’t managed to go on my

maiden voyage aboard the softly humming

Daimler, battery-electric bus (one of the new

95-bus HTM fleet that includes both 12-meter

 

solo and18-meter articulated busses); maybe

I’ll leave the house after breakfast tomorrow

morning and wait to see if lady luck brings one

and I’ll hop on to the end of the line at the beach

16MAR25 |  MY MOTHER’S PURSE

 

As a kid, I loved rummaging through my

mother's purse (or handbag as my grandfather,

the women’s shoe and accessories salesman,

would often refer to it); it was treasure trove

 

of miscellany, shiny things like keys, pillboxes

and lipstick holders; there was a clutch-sized

wallet that contained her checkbook and a wide

assortment of compartments for paper money,

 

coins, credit cards and photos; and there were

always a few of those small-sized photo albums

you would get for free when you developed your

film at Libby’s, these fake woodgrain, little square

 

ring-bound albums with their thin plastic pouches

where you inserted your snapshots; and there were

packets of Certs and Dentyne and the ever-present

golden plastic sheath that held a huge Kotex pad

17MAR25 |  THE WIDOW

 

I never thought of you as becoming a

widow one day, even through the last

two decades of dad’s illness; I suppose

it’s the same way I never thought of you

 

as being old, but the burden (I don’t know

any other way to put it) of being someone’s

caregiver—even if it is your own husband—

is enough to age anyone; and now you’re

 

alone, the weight of the world lifted from

your shoulders; the end of his suffering means

your suffering can end as well; nothing more

to bear, no more bad days, no more strangers

 

intruding upon the privacy of your home; now

it’s time to raise your head high again and take

back the life you sacrificed all these years and

make what you can of the years that remain

18MAR25 |  LAPSES

 

It’s happening more frequently of late,

becoming more concerning, debilitating;

these lapses in my ability to remember,

to keep my stories straight and keep once

 

stored away information stored away in

the place I originally stored it; first there

were the forgetful incidences: the wallet

then the water bottle left at work; then it

 

was my customer who travelled to the U.S.

who offered to bring me back some vegan

jerky—which he did months ago and we’d

already talked about his sojourn and the many

 

experiences he had; but two weeks ago he was

at the shop and we talked about it again as it had

never happened (and what about my jerky I asked

myself); then yesterday, the thing with Michael…

19MAR25 |  TWO LOSSES IN TOKYO

 

I actually looked into making the trip to Tokyo

to see the opening series of this year’s baseball

season (but it would have cost a small fortune!);

it was the Cubs versus the Dodgers in the sixth

 

ever MLB World Tour in Tokyo since 2000 and

the earliest regular season start in Major League

history; as I write this, I imagine the Cubs are in the

clubhouse at the Tokyo Dome showering, dressing

 

and getting their things ready to head to the airport

and catch their flight back to Arizona, where they’ll

continue Cactus League play on Friday at Sloan Park

in Mesa; I’m trying to think what the mood on the long

 

flight back across the Pacific will be; sure, there will be

an air of disappointment having lost both games, but

also a sense of exhilaration having had the experience

of playing a history-making series in a faraway land

20MAR25 |  ALL THESE MOVIES

 

All these movies—eighty-nine at last count

since the first of the year—are having what

I think to be a profound impact on me; it’s

a good thing, really, I feel my time is being

 

well spent and in the pursuit of enrichment,

enlightenment and entertainment, all three of

which I attain every single day, except on the

tenth of March, which was ten days after my

 

father passed away and the day, apparently, I

just couldn’t bring myself to watch a film as

it was the day may father’s passing had finally

sunk in and I wanted nothing more than to stay

 

in my bed and sleep; I have had more than a few

good laughs and certainly shed my fair share of

tears over these past few months as I continue to

discover the world through the eyes of others

21MAR25 |  UNCOMMON GROUND

 

I suppose what’s hard for me to bear

witness to is the way you seem to shun

every opportunity for happiness; it’s

cliché to say, but you could have had it

 

all, but I guess it’s just not who you are

or the way you were brought up; what’s

an even harder pill for me to swallow is

how (a)pathetic you’ve become, robotic,

 

callous, indifferent, predictable; you have

certainly lost the lust for life you had when

we first met and now it seems your boat is

sinking and you’re determined to bring us

 

all down with you; I understand how it may

seem romantic to want to navigate the waters

alone, but it’s not who we were meant to be;

so much uncommon ground beneath our feet

22MAR25 |  SPAIN

 

My first true love, Spain; from the moment I

landed on that crisp Sunday morning in October

of 1987, you stole my heart and right there and

then the seed was planted for what would become

 

a love affair that would last a lifetime; it’s hard to

believe I’ve now been away as many years as I

lived there, it seems like only yesterday when I

was a young man walking down the cobblestone

 

streets in Granada, or playing with my children in

the parque de amigos in Valencia, watching them

take their first steps on the Malvarrosa boardwalk

and in that hotel lobby in Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter;

 

I long to be reunited with my first love and live out

my days in her tranquil, sunny countryside where fresh

air and the smell of jasmine and orange blossom fill

my senses with everlasting joy, love and contentment

23MAR25 |  A FATHER’S LOVE

 

I love my children dearly (as any father would),

but I have come to understand that my children

will never love me as much as they love their

mothers, and I’m okay with that; you see, my

 

children’s mothers need their love more than I

do; these women, born and raised in ordinary

candlelit Catholic families in Holland and

Spain grew up teased and insecure and left

 

to fend for themselves, achieving academic

excellence, receiving numerous degrees in

graduate and doctoral studies; but it was love

that was lacking from their lives and from the

 

few relationships they had had, and so was any

semblance of self-esteem; I, in sharp contrast, have

always loved myself, not dependent on the love of

others; not selfish, simply out of intrinsic necessity

24MAR25 |  DECISIONS

 

When it comes to decisions, I’m not

always quick to make them and when

I do, I frequently regret the ones I’ve

made; and sometimes I make decisions

 

impulsively, which isn’t always a bad

thing (or a good thing); and sometimes

when confronted with having to make

a decision, it feels like the last thing I

 

want to do at that moment in time; so

yesterday I made a series of extremely

hasty decisions, and not only were they

about issues concerning me, but decisions

 

made that effected the lives and livelihoods

of other people; and today, it may be too

late to rescind those decisions and I will

be forced to accept their consequences

25MAR25 |  SPRINGTIME

 

I suppose I should just be happy

having survived another winter;

that the days are growing longer

and now that all traces of drugs

 

seem to have been flushed from

my body and that my body seems

to be functioning as good or even

better than it did before makes me

 

feel even better; better that I have

newfound clarity and an overall

improvement in vim and vigor, so

much so that I am walking again and

 

taking more sun and fresh air and,

as it may seem, emerging from the

deep funk of winter, from the throes

of death, darkness, despair and delirium

26MAR25 |  THE GIRL AND THE APPLE

 

I was waiting for my daughter outside

of her school, Wednesday is a short,

half day; when I was a kid, we used

to call those in-service days; so there

 

I am standing outside the school and

a little girl, no older than five or six,

runs out of the school building with

an apple in her hand, passes off her

 

backpack to her baldheaded, bearded

father and proceeds to take a bite out

of her apple while walking to retrieve

her bicycle; trying to pull her bike out

 

with one hand (lest the apple should

jar free from her grasp), she trips and

the apple falls to the ground covered

in dirt; she cried for nearly five minutes

27MAR25 |  IN BLACK AND WHITE

 

I’ve watched two old black and white

English films in as many days, one

made in 1948 and the other in 1957;

coincidentally the very same year my

 

favorite Hollywood music film Pal

Joey, was released (in Technicolor);

another coincidence is that the story

lines of the two British films in question,

 

The Fallen Idol (‘48) and Woman in a

Dressing Gown (‘57) both were about

marital infidelity, that’s to say, the two

male protagonists both had lovers for

 

who they wanted to leave their wives

to be with; these were brilliant films,

films that told stories of the everyday

life that everyday life often conceals

28MAR25 |  I WANT A URINAL

 

The first time I ever saw a bidet was

at my aunt Shirley’s house in Encino;

then years ago, at a hotel in Madrid on

my very first night in Spain in the fall

 

of 1987 (I employed said bidet to store

my toiletries and to wash out my socks

and underwear as my grandfather had

taught me to do while traveling); when

 

I later moved to Spain in the summer of

1996, we had not one but two bidets in

our apartment (as most Spanish bathrooms

do); and while I never used the bidet––well

 

perhaps once or twice to soak my feet!––

and while they are not commonplace in

the Netherlands, what I would like is a

urinal; that fixture would be most welcome

29MAR25 |  IT'S BEEN A MONTH NOW

 

It’s been a month now, since dad left us;

a month since I spoke to him just hours

before he passed and some fifty-five

years since he transformed from being

 

uncle Bob to daddy; it’s been a month

since mom said why don’t you try talking 

to him and suddenly he appeared there 

on my phone with an oxygen tube in his

 

nose and glassy eyes that seemed to see

right through me and into the depths of

my soul; I talked to him like it was any

other day, any other moment in time and

 

then I said goodbye for the last time; it’s

been a month now that he’s been gone, I’ve

thought about him, dreamed about him and

now I go on like we all go on…without him

30MAR25 |  I HATE HOWARD BRAMSON

 

Howard was a boyhood friend; we met at Clinton

Elementary in the second grade (about 1970 for

historical context); Howard was the first friend I’d

had who invited me to his house, the first friend who

 

had a dog (a little Schnauzer named Stein), and the

first friend whose parents (Donna and David, both of

blessed memory) got divorced; in 1976, Howard and

I had a falling out (I broke a solemn promise I made

 

never to reveal his middle name (Ned) to anyone and

I did (he chased me all the way home from Hebrew

school but I took refuge in my mother’s car as she

forgot to lock the doors!); we didn’t speak again until

 

five years later at our senior prom when we crossed

paths in the bathroom and he said Aren’t you going to

introduce me to your date? And I hate him (figuratively)

because he hasn’t gained a single pound since high school

31MAR25 |  FAREWELL TO MARCH

 

I’m hoping no one—or nothing else—dies in

what remains of the month of March; it's been

a month of loss: dad died at the beginning, my

new business expansion crashed in the middle,

 

and I’m hoping to get through these last fifteen

hours scot-free; it would be poignant, almost

romantic if another minor tragedy evolved as

they usually do at the end of months, but I am

 

confident I’ll look back at this tomorrow morning

thankful, optimistic and ready to move forward

with new plans and a renewed sense of purpose;

my latest project is moving along, albeit still in

 

the planning stages; I’m confident that I have a

winner and that it may become one of the best,

most successful of my life’s hairbrained schemes;

midnight is closer now and the future is ablaze

© 2025 R.M. Usatinsky/Aquitania Ventures

bottom of page