Category: childhood
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The handkerchief
Dad pulled it from his left back pocket folded to a dry spot and said, “Blow” It grossed me out one small square of cloth for all my siblings lined up in a pew To save my dignity I carried my own handkerchief quit sniffling in church or using my sleeve Sixty years on, I…
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Mother’s lilies
Do the lilies still rise up from cold ground by Easter Sunday Mother would marvel at their white gowns moving with the wind. Blossoms on long stems gold dust falling from stamens onto petal lips? 4-9-23
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haiku for a clover kind of day
spring clover blooms white childhood backyard memories and barefoot bee stings 4-13-23
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Graveside manners
I still carry my father’s casket, Holding onto the side rail As we pull him from the hearse, Unable to release my grip And say goodbye. I have questions in need of answers And he still won’t give them up, Even in death. I still carry my father’s casket Hoping he answers – just once.…
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Run-on sentence memory of Dad
My father dropped me off my first year of college, notebooks, pens, a dictionary and Bible in a cardboard box and a dress shirt I never wore on a hanger my mother packed for church and a suitcase of clothes, I was not an easy child to raise and he was nervous about me going…
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Two lifetimes ago
two lifetimes ago, returning from a lonely hike In mushroom mountains sat under a bush, light rain falling in the yard of a church I did not attend Johnny Cash sang about Sunday morning coming down on the radio of an idling car I left my body unburied, never returned and found a new one…
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Gamer suicide
When he first experienced a random act of kindness, it made him feel warm and when he thought he understood the concept, he tried it on others and soon it was randomness he sought and soon folks did not see him as kind and soon he became an oddity tolerated in polite company and laughed…
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For lack of empathy
I don’t know why, but fifty years on I thought of you, tall lanky friend of my youth, we used to sometimes talk walking home from high school; me bombastic and loud, all full of myself; you quiet, deferential and shy. We never became close; you a confirmed loner me a loner, hidden beneath layers…
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White lace
Where I sit the arm on our couch is worn It is then I understand why My mother and her mother and her mother… Sat for hours in a corner chair Crocheting frilly, white, lace doilies to protect The fabric of furniture from wear And I wonder about other tedious daily chores She performed to…
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I do not own a gun
My two older sisters had matching dolls. I had cars and trucks, a Roy Rogers’ holster with a silver cap gun. I used to hide in their closet and played with their dolls when no one was around. My mother was a girl scout leader; I know all the songs. I belonged to the boy…
My husband's poetry 