The Count

As a boy

I counted years

And soon

Dreamed of

How many novels

I would write

 

I remember

the braided rug

reading comics

grandma read obits

I wondered why

 

Then truck driver father

counts dollars

kids grow up,

who is left?

 

Left to count?

tombstones

empty bedrooms

ever smaller number

of family, of friends

 

dead

dead

they soon

are all dead

no novels, little money,

children gone,

dead

dead

and then

I am gone