I’ve been on a Kennedy reading kick lately, and I thought of all the loss Jackie and JFK both experienced. I thought of the trauma Jackie witnessed with the loss of her son in September and then her husband in November of 1963.
Dear Jackie
Jackie, how the world admires you
when it stands on the precipice
of disaster and hopes scatter
like glass broken after the
the car crashes on
a highway
in the desert.
Jackie, they always speak now
of your style and strength
in the days before and
after when it seems
a submarine sinks in
an ocean valley.
Jackie, I hope for the strength
most never speak of because
they do not dream of
what it requires.
I understand why you
smoke cigarettes, and
who cares if anti-tobacco
preaches when you and I
never forget what
we
have
lost.
Jackie, shake the ashes off
the end, and light
it up again. I know the
nightmares the
dark implores and
why you wish for
privacy when it seems
the world can never
see what you’ve lost
in ’56, and what you
bury in ’63.
Jackie, you’re so brave to
still wear the dress after
you witness bullets fly.
I give up her dress; the
one she wears on the
ambulance, the one I
wear that same day.
I rip the dresses I wear
to her visitation and her
funeral out of my closet,
and toss them away.
Jackie, tell me, before you
lost your Jack, did he
tell you when Patrick took
his last breath? Did you
scream or just light up
a cigarette? Jackie, with
a stillborn in ’56 and your
Patrick in ’63, how did
you still manage to
breathe?
Jackie, I understand why
you light those
cigarettes when they
turn off the camera’s lights.
Corrie's Season 
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