Ghost Me   by Nancy Schatz Alton

For Peter

I am all the people who are no longer here

Even as I am not

How could I be?

Yet I am a ghost

Yet I call your ghost

I call your river-rock-climbing body back

From the grave

From the rail line

From the box car

From your truck

The truck that used to pull up alongside me

As I ran that river road

You picked me up

Again and again

Offered me a mirror

Liked me for me

No judgment

How you slid myself back to me

Said here, my poet, here

The day my roommate said you loved me

I said, no, no he doesn’t

But you did

Not in a way that coveted

But in a way that said: let me show you yourself

Let’s drive to the river

The river that takes us in

The bridge above us

The day I found you climbing the river rocks

The way you made bird song

To mimic the birds

We were free back there

I call you back

I call you to this freedom I have found

I give you my bird song

I give you my freedom

Take these wings you first gave to me

Be the crow that teases my dog

You caw

I bark

We play