At the age of 88, my heart will attack me 
 



82: all you really need are large handled jugs of chardonnay and cat food 
 



I am 71. I tell my husband that I understand. Sometimes the only thing we can control in life is how we kiss it good-bye. I sleep beside his body for two days before I call anyone

 
 

In my 62nd year I learn that mercy imposes no conditions

 
 

At the age of 58, my husband sleeps with a woman who is not me. I wring my heart out like a sock

 
 

56: I make casseroles for the homeless, read to underprivileged children, start a neighborhood recycling program. I wonder when I will feel something  
 



I am 52. I bury my mother. Two months later my son steps in front of a train with his arms outstretched like Christ 
 



In my 49th year, I become far too interested in the lives of celebrities. I buy a Crock-Pot. I make too much food and my family looks at this weird abundance in silence

 
 

At the age of 47, my life does not suit my shoes or my cigarettes. I go out to get canned pineapple and I come home with two cocker spaniels and a homeless man

 
 

41: my son tries to tell me something. I ask him to wait. And he waits for years. That winter while driving I run over a rabbit. I throw my cell phone into a field and have an affair

 
 

I am 34. I realize that I love anyone who reads to me

In my 31st year, I wonder if I care for anything. I wonder if I am hungry out of habit

 
 

At the age of 30 I have a son. I am afraid to touch him. I leave him in the bathtub for long periods of time

 
 

27: I marry because that is what is next in the natural progression of things. I will spend the rest of my life feeling like I am living in someone else’s clothes 
 



I am 22. I believe in God because I refuse to accept that seahorses are an accident

 
 

When I am 17, I make the choice to look like the type of trouble certain men choose to get into

 
 

12: I learn that these are only words and we never mean them

 
 

9: I am punished for bringing home a stray cat. I learn that it is a liability to love

 
 

7: I believe in snowmen. I hope for more

 
 

5: I learn to be quiet 
 



4: I believe that my mother’s red car will be a fire truck when it grows up 
 



1: I learn how to say no. Two decades later, I will forgot how 
 



And at the point when I first meet myself, I already know that my ghost bones are engraved with directions.

TAGS: A Life Done Wrong, Hannah Wehr, poets

For 46 years HANNAH WEHR was a teenage runaway. In that time she did things she wouldn't force on a donkey and that includes things she forced on a donkey. Hannah is German slang for "I Don't Know." That about sums her up. Hannah is an unwitting connoisseur of French cigarettes and filthy men. In Bolivia there is a saying about her, and it goes: "Girl with monocle has nothing. Cover her in shaving cream. Calling all cars.” It translates weird. Hannah spends her free time eating other people’s food, thinking about Abraham Lincoln’s hat, attacking strangers' calves, making Thanksgiving dioramas, and boondoggling. What the critics are saying: “Hannah has a great personality---just not for a human being.” –Jasper Tin Pan Lintstockings “She is a fire hazard.” –Old man with shrimp tail stuck in beard “I think she just spilled her wine on my kid's head.” –Lady who will probably never ask her to babysit again

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This entry was posted on Sunday, December 6th, 2009 at 12:40 am and is filed under Poem, Poetry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.