Server of Survival - Adam Vanhee

poem read by Timothy Arliss OBrien

Server of Survival
Adam Vanhee

One of those half bus shelter/

half crack den deep downtown  

institutions is where I saw you.

You ascended those two steps,

onto the bus, effortlessly

like Gene Kelly when it rains.  

Only you hummed no song,

nor tapped any steps,

collapsing instead onto the first empty seat.

Besides your Superman jawline,

movements of the long-ago Roman 

soldier live in your body. 

Breathing out the troubles

of wherever you’ve come from,

you run the right hand along 

the buzz cut of your muddy 

puddled hair.  Dressed in black

from head to toe, I can’t help

but imagine you in the catering

line  of some golden event

space, dodging run-ins 

with the wealthy, who only

saw you as a checked box labeled 

“Hire Help”.  Lost in the folds

of your clothes, it is a Herculaneum 

challenge for me not to reach out

and press your worried head against 

mine own worn heart.  Feed you 

warmth, while assuring a twenty

something mind that this too

does pass.  And as you age,

little by little, those expectations 

will fall away………..and survival. 

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Adam Vanhee studies and writes poetry in Portland, Oregon, where he lives with his husband and two cats.
@elijahwhereareyou