Over at the Master's Artist . .

Glynn Young writes an amazing post about Frederick Buechner's poetry:

What is intriguing about these poems – also semi-autobiographical – is that they are about the suicide of Ted Schroeder, who killed himself by carbon monoxide poisoning because he believed his life had been nothing but failure.

Buechner’s father, Ted Buechner, killed himself in the same way and for the same reason as the fictional Ted Schroeder.

These are more than just story poems. They are poems of understanding.

The 16 poems carry the title of a specific Schroeder family member. The first one is “Ted Schroeder,” but it’s told from the viewpoint of his 11-year-old son, Teddy:

On my father’s last dawn
I remember he opened the door.
I remember he closed the door.
I remember no thing he said if he said
a thing. Goodbye, boys,
Teddy and Billy, goodbye.
I am going downstairs.
I am going to turn on the car.
I am going to sit on the running board
and hold my head in my hands.
The two terrible women I love
will look after you…