amphibi.us » »Donal Mahoney

Maybe It Was Sleep Apnea

Shannon Peil — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 20:34:50 +0000

Zenobia Jackson told Officer Murphy that her husband, Rufus, was 73
years old and “a wonderful man when he was awake” but for the past
year he had been jerking “something terrible” during his sleep and
had kept waking her up. He’d swing his arms, she said, like those
martial arts men he liked to watch so much on television. When the
bouts were over, he’d give her a big kiss on the forehead and go to bed.

“Oh, he was just a doll,” she said, “when he was awake.”

In the last month, however, Rufus had fallen out of bed three times
“fighting” in his dreams. In the morning he’d tell her he’d been
dreaming that he was in a fight at work or back in high school many
years ago. Sometimes he dreamt he was shooting at burglars breaking
into their house in the old neighborhood. That’s why they had to move
to a different neighborhood and why he bought a gun, a little pistol
he kept under his pillow just in case he heard someone in the house.
You can’t be too careful these days, he told her. He even taught her
how to shoot the gun one night when no one else was on the tennis
courts in Sherman Park. He said she was real good. Not many women, he
said, can aim straight.

But last night, she said, he was dreaming again and swung his arms at
least ten times, like he was chopping sugar cane back in Louisiana
before they moved North. He caught her with an elbow to the eye and
then another to the nose just as she was ducking. That’s why she
looks the way she does, she told Officer Murphy.

Long ago, she had stopped trying to wake him when he was thrashing
about. It was because of the pistol under his pillow. He had reached
for it one time right after she had shaken him. She had screamed and
that woke him up and he wasn’t too happy about it. He said he
couldn’t get back to sleep the rest of the night. And he wasn’t lying
because she was awake all night, too, listening to him grumble and
curse.

Just a week ago, she had taken him to a sleep clinic where he had
stayed overnight. The doctor said he suffered from sleep apnea but
she had never heard of anyone with sleep apnea thrashing and kicking
about like her Rufus. She had a lady friend in the choir at church
whose husband had sleep apnea but all he did was “snore too loud,”
her friend said, no thrashing about.

“So that’s how it happened,” Zenobia told Officer Murphy, who was
busy taking notes. Rufus had reached under the pillow for the pistol
and she had to stop him.

“Two in the head,” she said, “and he be dead.”

© Donal Mahoney, 2012

[others]

Bending, Grabbing, Sorting

Shannon Peil — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 18:27:57 +0000

Chinese Laundry, Chicago

In a storefront laundry
on North Clark Street
brown draperies release
this quiet man

who has my shirts.
He smiles and bows–
how carefully
he wraps them.

Before the draperies
fall back, I see,
for a moment,
in a circle swirling

almost out of sight
three kerchiefed women,
glistening black,
bending, grabbing, sorting.

© Donal Mahoney, 2012

[others]

My Therapist’s a Lady

Shannon Peil — Mon, 23 May 2011 17:04:51 +0000

It’s all so simple now,
yet it took 30 years
to begin to understand.
It’s as though someone
stole the primer I had
and gave me another
in my own language.
It’s because you are
who you are
that I’ve begun
to become who I am.
That sounds too dramatic.
All you did, really, was scream
when you opened the bathroom door,
saw me wrapped in a towel,
standing at attention on a mat,
waiting in my thirtieth year
for the steam to clear
from the cabinet mirror,
waiting for someone
to shout, “At ease.”

© Donal Mahoney, 2011

[others]

Nutmeat

Shannon Peil — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 18:28:58 +0000

My dear, tell me again so I know
how it would have been
had you married the man

you dream of all day, tell me again
as I lie next to you now,
your nutmeat sweet in my mouth.

Tell me again so I know
how to feel for fathering five
on you fast, five in six years,

five who will never be quiet again
in our lives, five who will leave
in the night when they are of age

while up in our room I nibble
on nutmeat, proud to have traded
an oak for these acorns.

© Donal Mahoney, 2011

[others]

Leaving the Station

Shannon Peil — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 18:55:00 +0000

Each morning
I step from the train
and march with the others

leaving the station.
The weatherman’s warned of rain
so we’re armed

with umbrellas,
our briefcases swinging.
Across from the station

there’s an old hotel
high in the sky. King Kong,
everyone calls it.

In tall windows
old men appear,
disappear, reappear.

It is August in Chicago
and the old men wear
overcoats and homburgs

so no one can steal them.
They light cigarettes,
mumble and curse

at the daily parade
leaving the station.
Traffic is thick

but even in winter
no one looks up
since no one can hear them.

© Donal Mahoney, 2010

[others]

Returning to Work

Shannon Peil — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 21:20:19 +0000

After the others had welcomed him back,
had shaken his hand and returned to their desks,
another as ancient pulled over his chair
to inquire of him who six months before
had been taken away
on a pallet of interlocked arms
and parallel faces:
“What happened that day?
No one would say.”

Both men talked softly,
held cigarette rites:
the delights of the tapping,
the lighting, the stubbing,
the one man explaining,
the other one listening,
both of them knowing
a matter of months.

© Donal Mahoney, 2010

[others]

All I Did Was Admire Her Aloud

Shannon Peil — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 13:53:48 +0000

Rogers Park, Chicago

“Quiet, please,” I tell her,
“I want to hear the music.”
She is sitting next to me again,
this time on a paisley couch,
a woman in a lime bikini I met
only this morning sprawled
on the Morse Avenue Beach.
All I did was admire her aloud,
not recognize her age, and an hour later
she brought me home with her.
Now she is curling into me again
and moaning at a remarkable pitch.
Finally she spits into my neck
what it’s about,
this time and every time,
“Honey…I am…coming.”

[others]

Two Appliqués

Shannon Peil — Wed, 26 May 2010 15:54:46 +0000

If the greatest of these
is charity
then tell me again
why it’s gauche
if this young man
in a booth at a bar
dives under the skirt
of the farmer’s widow
smiling across from him.

There he will find
what he’s after
and get that big kiss
before driving her home
through jackhammer rain
and flying with her
through the windshield
making a turn.

Now they’re a legend,
the talk of the town,
emblazoned forever
for pickups to see
as two appliqués
on a viaduct wall,
their Rorschachs
bright red,
whatever their ages.

[others]

Stroke

Shannon Peil — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 19:35:20 +0000

Ireland to America, long ago

In this Kerryman’s eyes
you can still see
big ships sail
and lighthouses flicker
light years away.
He’s 70 today
and sits tombstone straight
in his caneback chair.
He waves at the flake
hanging from his nose,
misses and curses.
It’s his first curse of the day
and he’s ready now for anything,
an ancient ram braced for the British
climbing through the mist.
His children, parents themselves now,
sit in his parlor, silent around him.
When they hear that first curse,
they know it’s 20 years earlier
and Father is calling
a big meeting of the Family.
They shift in their chairs
as his eyes and his words
whiz around the room
like bees liquored up
looking for something to sink into.

[others]

The Scapular

Shannon Peil — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 08:42:39 +0000

The money debated and settled,
flipped from his wallet, tossed in her purse,
they prepare to take off.

At first thrust, she reaches up,
throws the scapular
over his shoulder, shouts

“What’s this?” He rolls off,
stares at the ceiling,
says, “Cancel the trip.”