Ode to an Oscillating Fan

by Michelle Patton

Ronan Furuta

Equation of air and motion,  construction of metal and plastic, so patient in the spare room of winter, our friend in the valley summers, such desire  to be a cool blessing, your glad face turning  from side to side all day. Little factory  of breath, carried into the boy’s room at night,  your cord slung over his arm, your breezy  presence a needed lullaby for this teenage  construction of sorrow and flesh, this boy whose father is in the grave, boy who folds up and keeps what he knows behind a stoic stare, boy who needs you near all night. Little keeper of secrets  and dreams, you’ll stir up the dust in his small room,  hum him to sleep for a few more years, turn and turn  again until your plastic bones crack  and your mechanical heart gives out.

*

Michelle Patton’s poems have been published in Zyzzyva, Southern Poetry Review, Dying Dahlia Review, and others. She teaches English at Fresno City College.