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02/17/09 - (1)
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From the very beginning of his memory, He recalled clinging not to his mother's breast But to things. Collecting things was a way of controlling his world, Creating a nest, a refuge, for his asocial spirit. At the start, as he'd lay supine, in his crib, His tiny, chubby, groping, disembodied hands Would gather, to him, objects suspended in space; His eyes, brain coveted, craved all the toys Hanging, dangling above him. At age three, he accumulated shoeboxes Scattered in his mom's closets, Then, in the two years before he started kindergarten, Waxed butter cartons and tin cans, from the trash bin Out back of his WWII apartment building. Then he was off and running, Hoarding, with prodigiously dizzying acquisitiveness, Comic books, baseball flipping cards, coins, stamps — Artifacts he could barter with schoolmates, Perfecting his skills in the high art of horse trading, And all this by the ripe old age of ten. During the next four decades, he expanded his interests, To include Lionel electric trains, rare Faulkner first editions, Nineteenth-century mechanical Americana, Real estate — developing, aggregating shopping centers. He was one very driven man. Every minute of each day was spent devising plans. Contriving new ploys for amassing more and more Preoccupied his deliberations. He had no time for quiet time, downtime, time off. Indeed, he thrived on dreaming up the next scheme, Executing the next contract, Concocting the next formulation, the next platform, For adding to his metastasizing richesse. As for the three wives, nine children...well... They were so much window dressing, Necessary stuff that legitimized his compulsiveness, By masking his maniacal fixation on things, Giving the impression that he was a devoted family man, Not a creature with a warehouse mentality. After he died, in his late fifties, His estate, rumored to be worth billions, was probated, Taxed, distributed to his lawyers and heirs, dissolved. To this day, in his spacious mausoleum's only crypt, He dickers with death, over who gets other people's souls.
02/17/09 - (1)
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