Friendship, In Metaphor
Yesterday I wrote of family.
A family of geese was the metaphor.
Today I write of friendship
and what can symbolize it best.
The first thing that came to mind
was my morning cup of coffee,
not that it is so good, oh, my, no.
For every cup of "good" coffee
I have ever had I have drunk
at least ninety bad cups
and ten more that were awful.
I do not mean to say a friend
is a "one in a hundred" thing,
that just slipped out,
but that morning cup of coffee,
good, bad, or awful,
when it is there at the right time
it does not have to be anything except itself,
helping me to get going
when the whole world could care less.
I pour it, sugar it, stir, hold it in my hand,
sip, "Yeah, thanks, old buddy."
I may not even finish it.
It is not the drinking,
but its being there that counts.
But a friend ought to be there
more than just when
the rest of the world
is telling you to phone ahead,
make a reservation.
I mean, I like that morning cup of coffee
and it is a real important thing in my life,
but as the metaphor for friendship,
it is not quite what I had in mind..
There is my cat, though.
Tigs is a friend and
what a friend he is.
He walks up to me,
puts his nose on my nose,
and if ever love was requited this is it.
Or he lies there on the bed
when I come in, looks up,
blinking those big eyes, asking,
it seems, "You need something, friend,"
and I cannot help myself.
I feel so good and smile,
pet him, give him a hug and a kiss,
and I cannot for the life of me
remember why I am there
or what I came upstairs to do.
He is a joy.
The way he sits and watches birds,
curls up on the window sill, looking out,
scratches at the door until I open it,
and then runs away, will not go out.
I do not know what I would do without him,
but as a metaphor for friendship
I have some reservations.
He is more like a wife or a mistress,
a very pleasant diversion,
a satisfier of real needs,
important, oh, yes, no doubt,
but unlike the morning cup of coffee
he and they may not always be there,
and I am not sure I would want them to be.
I was at a loss.
The geese just happened.
I did not have to ask myself what family meant.
There they were.
I wrote,
and that was that.
But friendship, real solid gold friendship,
I had to ask myself
just what I thought that meant.
Then this morning,
Providence intervened as it usually does.
The message came through
with a blast of trumpets,
a thousand voice chorus,
and a fly-by by the Blue Angels.
My underwear,
that has got to be it.
When I stepped into them this morning,
my toe caught a small hole,
caught and tore them horribly.
In front there is less of them than me.
I only had three pairs left
and now I am down to two,
and one of them was torn worse than these were
before I caught my toe.
The third and last pair is in the wash.
Underwear, my jockey shorts,
plain, white, tight at crotch and waist,
my security before anything the world can throw at me.
I always wear them clean when I go out.
No matter what happens,
when I am found, my jockeys will be there,
pristine, my mother taught me that.
My underwear asks nothing of me,
supports me,
accepts me at my most humanness,
never questions,
does not judge,
lies selflessly between me and the criticisms of the world,
between my insecurities and those who would assail them.
My underwear is always there.
I can think of only two occasions
when it is not on,
in the bath or swimming
and during sex.
Even then they are nearby,
the first thing I put on.
and they never, never ask anything in return.
What do I do now with these, the torn ones?
Throw them out with the trash?
Never.
Bury them perhaps?
I would need some kind of a burial box
so they cannot be dug up someday and be misunderstood.
This caring is the final test of the metaphor.