Thirteen outlaws swung
in the breeze by movie’s end.
At age five, I preferred the hero’s
role, sporting a pair of six-shooters
and Captain Marvel’s cape.
But now death’s mystery
corralled me.
Did they really die? I asked my mother.
Oh, no, the actors don’t die.
It was possible to hang, die,
and still eat dinner.

I found a clothesline rope, fashioned
a noose, climbed an oak tree,
and prepared
to jump.

Stop!

Out ran my mother,
confusing me
with her lie.

(No. 97 in a series of responses to Han-shan’s Songs of Cold Mountain)

As a poet friend noted, a quality characterizing poets in general is the presence of weird childhood events. Or is it just that poets write about them? In the original version of this poem, I added a line to the last stanza about my mother’s action also “bestowing life” (again). This she did, but the actual feeling at the time was one of confusion, even a sort of betrayal. Sorry, Mom.

(Numeric reference to Han-shan’s poem reflects the order of presentation in Burton Watson’s translation, presented as Cold Mountain, Columbia University Press, 1970.)