Breakfast of Champions

So at fifty you set them free
whispered, “Bon voyage,” and disappeared
into your reflection, into the leak
as Kilgore Trout remained alone
and confused – repeating, “Make me young,”
in your father’s voice – a choice:
all those characters suddenly free
in nineteen seventy three.

I guess a selection reflected
upon later, after Galapagos
as a man without his country
you took your final breaths.
I closed your book late that night
and the next morning I read:
“Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
(1922-2007) So it goes.”

Suddenly, I knew breakfast
would never be the same.