20160327 (inheritance)

Started as a good intention but was overwhelmed by a psychological pathology. Could be worse: I might put it all on computer and sort items as they are entered. And still end up going to the hardware store.

Possessions can paralyze even

The stoutest of hearts. That

Possessed needn’t be large,

Expensive, or scarce. In fact

It is often because they are 

Not scarce that they induce

Cardiac arrest if confronted

Too often or too seriously.

My father was one who saved

The nuts and bolts from what

He disassembled rather than

Discard them as waste. In 

His day recycling was a word

That applied only to children

Peddling a second time around

The block. I don’t recall how 

He came by the little glass

Jars to store them. I was the

Youngest and long past the 

Baby food stage. Unlike me

He was not averse to storing

Bolts as a batch in quart-size

Mason jars that tinted the 

Contents greener than they

Were. Likewise another for

Nuts, another for screws,

Nails were a mixed supply

In empty paint cans too 

Heavy for my little arms

To lift. The problem of course

With mixed storage of anything

Is that to find the things you

Need you must dump the 

Batch out (preferably on a 

Stiff and capacious white

Board with a lip to keep the

Agglomeration from rolling

Off the table top and under

the bench) and begin the hunt

For the precise type and number

Of items you desired, often

Discovering that you didn’t 

Have enough of your preferred

So you’d have to recast the 

Project in terms of what you

Did have. Or, observing that

You had four bolts but only

Three nuts, or three bolts and

Four nuts, you scooped all of

It back into the jars after an

Hour’s searching and announced,                                    

“Jimmy, I'm going to the 

Hardware store. Come along

For the ride?” When he and

Mom had both died I inherited

His old tool box, a grand wooden

Chest of many drawers, beaten up

Around the edges but choked 

With a variety of metal half-foot

Rulers finely scribed to 64ths,

Micrometers, devices to

Measure inner- and outer-

Diameters, leaf-like thin

Metal gauges to measure gaps,

And a bewildering variety of 

Other tools of the parts inspector

Trade. Some hard steel rods

Were ground to sharp points

As cutting tools to be clamped

In a lathe. Some of this stuff

I still have loose in a drawer

In the basement. Where the fine

Wooden chest went I haven’t

The slightest. And exactly how

His gene for scarfing parts, wood,

And tools came to be multiplied

In my blastular formation 

Conjoint with my mom’s

Penchant for matching salt

And pepper shakers I’ll leave

To anyone interested in my 

Posthumous genomic analysis.

c. J.S.Manista, 2016