Alec Solomita’s fiction has appeared in the Southwest Review, The Mississippi Review, Southword Journal, and The Drum (audio), among other publications. He was shortlisted by the Bridport Prize and Southword Journal. His poetry has appeared in The Ekphrastic Review, Gnashing Teeth Publishing, The Galway Review, Bold + Italic, Litbreak, Subterranean Blue Poetry, The Blue Nib, Red Dirt Forum, and elsewhere.  His chapbook, “Do Not Forsake Me,” was published in 2017 and is still available at Finishing Line Press and Amazon. His first full-length book of poetry was published last April by Kelsay Press. He’s working on another. He lives in Massachusetts.

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Phone Call

I talked to my father the night before he died.
He was in rehab, I was far away.
His gentle grainy voice was weaker
more gentle, more grainy than usual.
But he sounded okay, there just for
a broken foot. Nothing bleak like
pneumonia, heart trouble, the
baseball player’s awful sentence.

Really, we just chatted, Dad and I,
I told him about my new temp job
selling something or other on the
telephone. The lady boss liked
my voice. It was strong and clear
back then. Commanding.
Confident. That’s where
I was the next day, doing

some copying on the copy
machine when I was told
I had a phone call, which
took me by surprise. Moreso
when my beautiful, gentle
sister said to me with a
catch in her throat,
“Are you sitting down?”

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My Father Couldn’t Drive

My father couldn’t drive
but that didn’t stop him,
knowing that guardian
angels protecting him would
always be there making sure

that the car would run
with or without gas, that the
compromised passenger seat door
wouldn’t swing open on a turn,
that no one would be coming up from behind
when he pulled out from the curb.

One bright morning in 1959,
he took my toddler brother
for a little ride down
Memorial Drive. (I think
they were going to Tree Land)

when diminutive Chris
slipped off the front seat
and tumbled through the
swinging door to the pavement.
My dad didn’t notice he was alone
for at least three or four blocks.

But the angels apparently
were still with us.
Chris was unscathed
as oncoming traffic
screeched to a halt
and drivers surrounded
him like Magi.

“Apparently, Chris decided to walk,”
was how Dad told it afterwards,
tears of hilarity streaming from his eyes,
“That was his prerogative,” he always added.

I’ve thought about Chris a lot since,
with his rubber pants and baby shirt
sitting in the sharp sunshine,
on the black asphalt with cars
whizzing by him at sixty miles an hour.

My father never drove again
and my mother never got a license.
For a while, we kids would have a blast
climbing into the car rusting
in the driveway and thrill
to the deep rumble when
we pressed the starter button.