With Everything I've Seen
by Shaawan Francis Keahna
In all my long life, what bowls me over isn’t the way each sheaf of smog coalesces to trick us still earthside into thinking the sun’s twinned, nor the pitted deserts stretched outward where our famous lakes once furrowed, nor the irretrievable moments I repeated for the duration of what came to be known as the beginning, what I had thought was the end.
How I’d go to the kitchen in the morning and open the blinds, take my place beneath the wooden painting of the Last Supper and watch the squirrels try to kill each other over the birdseed, how my wife would hobble into our kitchen to quarrel at me or ask if I’d got around to that thing, yet, any number of things I had to get around to, fixing roofs or mowing lawns or delivering food to men younger than me because I was always young for my age. I’d smile at her and she’d smile back in her cynical way, though she wasn’t, it was put on, she really was the happiest person I knew and that’s why she had to complain about so many useless little things.
Once, when we were making our end-of-life preparations, our grandson had asked us if we were sure. My wife had looked up at him and snorted. “Well,” she said, “if I had it my way, I’d live forever.” He, being of the generation that knew all the old fables, myths, fairytales and TV shows making a strong case against immortality, asked, “What would you do if you lived forever?” She shrugged and said, “Keep on going.”
No, what bowls me over is the long birdcage that spanned my mother-in-law’s retirement home is empty now. I remember it clearly: we’d spent her last Christmas here, me, her daughter, our children and grandchildren. The mesh ran the length of the room, which was lit by a crystalline dome to minimize the lighting bill and also keep residents attuned to the sun. There were trees, real trees and synthetic, which bloomed tiny birds, yellow, red, pink, on every branch and exposed root. They seemed happy enough, though it only took my grandson a year before he drew a parallel between the caged birds and his great-grandmother.
“Where’d they go?” I ask him now. My arms are crossed in gingham over my chest and my wrinkled hands grasp at nothing.
My grandson tilts his head at me and turns up his hearing aids. “Come again? Oh, the birds. I guess they let ‘em out.” He coughs for a long time, thick, ropy coughs that animate his jowls and knock his wire-rimmed glasses from his big tomato nose.
“Out where?” I look up at the dome, now shuttered, then over to the dimmed, greying window panes.
Instead of answering, my grandson says, “I caught up to you.” He can’t look me in the eye. “Didn’t I?”
“Oh, my boy,” I say. “Don’t come no further.”
“Don’t worry,” he says. “I won’t.”
Shaawan Francis Keahna lives far away from his entire family, but it’s okay, because his home is beautiful and full of good people, plus he goes back when he can. He’s currently studying philosophy, law, and ethics with a special focus on history at the University of Baltimore. More about him can be found at shaawan.com, where he maintains an erratic newsletter.
