Rochelle Jewel Shapiro
“Wherever I Am, I Wake Up in Far Rockaway”
“Protective Services”
& “Sleep App”
Wherever I Am, I Wake Up in Far Rockaway
Even in Phoenix, I wake to the sough of the sea,
its salt breath like ghost messages. I wake
to my father’s footprints in snow that lead away
from the house to his grocery each dawn.
In the yellow kitchen beneath the Felix-the-Cat
wall clock, my mother squeezes fresh orange juice
and serves my two sisters and me
soft-boiled eggs in tiny rose petal eggcups.
Wherever I am, I wake to my husband
as he was at seventeen, his arm around my waist,
his foot resting on the metal rail of the boardwalk
to watch the Wednesday night fireworks.
The gulls cry. Everyone is alive.
Footprints are fresh in the snow.
Protective Services
A black cat pads out of a driveway toward me
as I plod in the sauna of August heat
in a land where I’ve only recently landed.
I double-step to not let him cross my path.
Up the street, a crow lands on the black asphalt.
I go forward and back, trying to figure out
which fate to face down.
With the cat nearing, I dash
toward the crow. It flies off, but the cat
is at my heels.
Neighbors peer at me through their car windows.
(No one walks in exurbia.) They must be ready
to phone Adult Protective Services
for the old lady racing a cat in the August heat.
Just before I get the call that my husband has died,
a hawk screeches and screeches from a treetop.
Sleep App
The wind’s whip, whoosh, the rain’s ratatat,
and the soft crackle of thunder lull my lids
shut, but I fret about you, my husband,
in your bed at the Kingsway Arms,
still unsure of how to press the Help Me
gizmo,
and me, alone
in this house meant for us.
Who will hold me
when I hear my dead mother howl
from her railed bed at Pilgrim State?
Who will hold me when I cry out,
“No, Daddy, no!”
Without you beside me, I pop in and out of dreams like a cuckoo
in a cuckoo clock. I, a graying troubadour,
sing a lullaby of missing things:
shopping lists, passwords, keys, scissors, the deed . . .
You were my compass’s
fixed foot. I circled you, asking,
“Where is...” and before
you could say boo, whatever was lost
came into view.
In my dream, you wake me as you always did.
The sun rises like a sliced grapefruit,
sending upward a mist.
Nothing is fixed now. Once I had a landline.
These days I have two cell phones. I use one
to find the other.
Rochelle Jewel Shapiro is the author of Miriam the Medium (Simon & Schuster) and the Indie Finalist, Kaylee’s Ghost. Her essays have appeared in The New York Times (Lives), Newsweek, and more. Her poetry was nominated twice for Pushcart Prizes and once for The Best of the Net. Her poetry collection, Death, Please Wait, will be published in 2023 by Box Turtle Press. Currently, she teaches writing at UCLA Extension. You can reach her at https://rochellejshapiro.com, or on Twitter @rjshapiro.