July 30, 2016

The dead are visiting me again;
Skating into dreams and reminding.
There are things you need

To do for yourself.
Sometimes, they inhabit the bodies,
Cloaks of themselves in the past

Life they briefly shared with me.
Other times, ethereal whispers
Of extinguished chandeliers

And bowing lilac branches.
Sue reminds me to look in 
On her girls - young women now -
Whom she had to leave
Before any of them were 
Ready for good-bye. 

And, Nana, frail in the never
Met body of her 91-year-old 
self, five years later

Than she left, feet slow
But steady. Last night, I walked her
Up the stairs and into the eternal banquet. 

This is Poem #134 from the  Poem (almost) Everyday Project. Starting in mid-January 2016, I challenged myself to spend a year in which I’d wake most mornings and write a poem before my first cup of coffee. By the end of the year,  I had written 241 poems.  Here, I have published second drafts of  those pieces copied directly from my journal with minimal editing from their “vomit draft” state.

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