O, brothers
Patrick T. Reardon
O, mother. O, father.
O, brother self-gone.
O, gentle mechanic.
O, woman of thunderhead.
O, sleeper on the el train bassinette.
O, addled Denmark Jones of blessed memory,
sidewalk wanderer, striding the Chicago grid
like a voyageur, like a land surveyor,
like a shuckling rabbi,
like a lance-pierced ecstatic,
like the self-watcher up near the ceiling,
looking down on the antiseptic table as if
half in and out of heaven.
O, mother. O, father.
Who never, help me to pray.
I am rolling through my days,
a foreigner in the unfriendly land
of my flesh and blood and bones and sinews.
O, brother self-gone.
Help me to stay,
rooted like a tree for thousands of seasons,
tens of thousands of springs and winters,
until the vandal arrives.
O, Denmark.
Help me to roll like a rock
down the bank to the gray river water
with its fat, ugly, orange fish and
its paint-factory residue mud
and its shadows at dusk, profound and baffling.
The East Europe rhythm
of the McDonald’s old men.
The white goatee old man with coffee skin
asleep with his head flat on the table.
The old man with an Egg McMuffin
writing these words.
Balled up in the dust in prayer
or terror or the unnameable.
Rocking in hope of sleep.
Black sky neon.
Patrick T. Reardon
7..26
This poem originally appeared in Sabr Tooth Tiger Magazine, Issue no. 2, June 2026.
Written by : Patrick T. Reardon
For more than three decades Patrick T. Reardon was an urban affairs writer, a feature writer, a columnist, and an editor for the Chicago Tribune. In 2000 he was one of a team of 50 staff members who won a Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting. Now a freelance writer and poet, he has contributed chapters to several books and is the author of Faith Stripped to Its Essence. His website is https://patricktreardon.com/.