Memoir Addendum – Old Symptoms Of Bronchitis Mostly Gone

Spent most of my formative years
Till the end of my first short marriage
In and around the glittering miasma
Of a small steel mill town
At the mouth of the Black River
On Lake Erie’s southern shore

Walking home in the dark
After late orchestra rehearsals
Or Judo classes and the like
The air usually glittered in the
Glow of the streetlights
As did the sidewalks and streets

Before the Federal Government
Force mills to put ‘scrubbers’ on
Blast furnace stacks
The black dust on our window sills
Even with windows locked closed
Was gritty and rough to the touch

I must have inhaled a ton of it as
I also labored in the mill
A couple of times that
Included my apprenticeship
Before I left to distance myself
From my failed past
Anticipating brighter prospects

But the symptoms of the
Black ‘glitter’ followed me
Wherever I moved
Until settling in the
High Sonoran Desert
Where Tucson’s dust
Is not so tough
As the black glittery stuff

With bronchitis symptoms
Mostly gone
And only the occasional wheeze
When the pollen’s strong

–LE – 9/2/25

PS: I mentioned to a friend recently that my move to Tucson has helped my Bronchitis symptoms, so composed this little prose-poem to record my feelings on it…