Set by Ralph James Savarese

Set

I’ve broken so
many bones,
that the word
fracture might
as well be father.
I love you, fracture…
Each cast was
a coffin, and home
room, a kind of wake
where the mourners
signed my body.
Punning, the doctor
said, “You’re all set!”
Every femur
needs a foster
placement.

*

Ralph James Savarese is the author of three collections of poetry: Republican Fathers; When This Is Over; and, with Stephen Kuusisto, Someone Falls Overboard: Talking through Poems.

2 thoughts on “Set by Ralph James Savarese

  1. wow, I love the play of this metaphor, despite the gravity of the subject. a wonderful poem. It hurts me, even as I admire it.

  2. Always a mixture of pleasure and pain in an RJS poem. Ralph Savarese uses his surgical skill-set with MASH-like brevity: borrowing high-intensity scenes from life, re-contextualising them with Radar’s gentleness, compassion & innate justice.
    Always, all ways, great to read not once,
    but thrice.

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