Old McDonald (is dead)

I know your name isn't
"McDonald" (My mother says
all she remembers is
"John" and that your
last name was not McD)

but that's what I remember
repeating to myself as
this tiny preschool spinner

when my brother and I sat
in your garage-art-studio

in a summer of early 90s.

I remember you were

towering and you had a beard that

I would call a marker

of a bear in later years

when I would try to trace out

in sculpting emotions in clay and

found objects.

I don't remember meeting you

more than once.

The motorcycle parts that fanned out

like a chart of the

cycles of the moon over

your desk where you sat to

talk payment for

that painting of mother in

neon cups whose

eyes cut flat. The

smell of grease and

the dust thick with oil

never escaped from under my nails.

10 years later I realized "your" scent-shape

formed under my hands as

I crafted a shape of myself

in other people's throw-aways-

how long did you shape my

busy sculpting before

I thought to ask my mother

for your name? Your history?

Your life?

I wish I knew where you are buried.

I wish I could bring you

one of the little things

your scent-shape built in me.

But a child's Old Mcdonald

is dead.