Poetry by Dick Westheimer

            ​ Peter Corbett CC



​
The last time I said Do you know who I am

I was so high, I really didn’t know. I asked my buddy 
who slurred, You are Dicky, definitely Dicky, 
he spun around, wild-eyed, said, 
But I am so fucked up, man. I just don’t know.

He spilled to the ground, sat lotus posed, 
cupped the word “Do” in his upturned palms.
Doooo, he crooned.  Dooooo, like a mantra. 
Doooo. Doooo. Such a far-out word. He exhaled hard

and “Do” puffed into dust. Next he held the word 
“You” between his thumb and forefinger. “You” shone 
like a blue gemstone. As he peered into it, I saw his eye, 
bright as the snow moon and cried. I saw

right through that that jewel – an image,
my beautiful friend, older, his Saturn-wide smile 
pinched –

 a vision of how he’d married Rose, 
how she’d unraveled, 
                                          saw spirits, 
was an off-leash Doberman about the littlest things: 
a missing snippet of paper, a harsh word from years before, 
                                                           a star 
concealed behind clouds. 
                               She’d walk off in the night, find her way 
        to an all night cash-and-carry.         Under the buzzing blue lights 
she’d sob, beseech the weary shift worker, 
                                               Do you know who I am? 

My buddy looked back at me through 
that same lysergic acid-etched lens, saw 
a gauzy future – me living a perfect life 
with a perfect wife, with our perfect kids.  

So a few years later when his Rosey really did come undone,
Dwight didn’t tell me, he just fell from my life. He changed 
his phone number, pulled the blinds tight. 

After his kids had grown he finally called. We met for coffee. 
Over the steaming mugs, he told me of the lunacy, said the crazy was half magic, 
that Rose brought tea in china cups to old women living under bridges, 
spoke Truth with cats and dogs. 

                                                             Other times 
              she’d run into the woods, 
her skimpy robe snagging on brambles. 
                               She’d 
              be gone til morning - or the next.  
                                                                            She’d curse 
their kids and hitchhike to dive bars in Indiana, sleep 
              on restroom floors, not call for weeks, 
                                                               finally come home 
      and tear her hair into ragged wads and stuff it 
down the drains.

              He looked up from his still-full mug, his hands
              cupping it as if it were still warm, said, 
              “Now, Dicky, you know who I am.” 
    
              Fifty years later, he is the only one 
              who still calls me “Dicky.”

​


Dick Westheimer has—with his wife and writing companion Debbie—lived on their plot of land in rural southwest Ohio for over 40 years. His most recent poems have appeared or are upcoming in Rattle, Paterson Review, Chautauqua Review, RiseUp Review, Minyan, Gyroscope Review, and Cutthroat. More can be found at dickwestheimer.com