For Uncle Hank

How many times have I had too many drinks
to drown, the cold
liquid numbing 
until I slump over

my desk, not the bathtub – as you did—
heart stopped. How much had you had 
had enough	 had too much   had it 

to bring that big body down, to quiet 
that beating? 

They jolted you alive and you hung on,
tethered, machines beeping, beeping,
keeping you in a rhythm of your own. 

You (I imagine since I can’t see you) 
3000 miles of land between us 
(and hospital protocol besides)
never had much patience for rules.

I am trying to hover above you, to see
what’s left— so sudden did this come.

From your phone came the unexpected voice
which told me all before words could. 

You were my summer brother, three months younger.
I blame our genes and that man you called Dad, 
I called Grandpa. 

Anyway, this isn’t about him.
Even dead, he still takes up too much room.

I think you must take up no space at all now
where you are (or soon will be), 
dancing with your big gray cat, Rudy. 

Your mom is there with her perfectly-coiffed hair, 
her quick wit cutting any umbilical cord
tying you to the earth. 

Jerry Garcia is surely waiting, with his phantom finger 
picking every string in all the notes 
you wrote in the best corner of your mind, 

his gruff voice beckoning you to come along:
the road isn’t paved with gold, but it’s infinitely long.