This morning on the radio

This morning on the radio,
Molly Johnson commenting on a song by Amos Lee:

Flower rhymes with power.

She had named the tree

"Won't it be nice when the tree is full of green leaves?"
"No! Then I won't be able to see the street."

She had named the tree outside her window Old Ugly.
I said, "I think Old Ugly is pretty".
She grimaced.

Each day the daffodils gets taller

Each day the daffodils get taller
Long green shoots get longer
It is time
It is time

The pile of clean laundry

The pile of clean laundry is growing
On the table in the corner under the window
This soft burgeoning
Waiting to be picked up, put on

Across the room

Across the room, one woman said to another, "I am so glad my first name wasn't Tracy [though her middle name was]...I haven't known many Tracy's and the ones I've met I didn't like very  much...".

This was overhead by two other women, one of whom was named Tracy. Quietly, the inadvertent eavesdroppers giggled and smiled.

She said, when I was growing

She said, "When I was growing up I always wanted to call my daughter, Olivia, and then for short, I would call her, 'Liv".

Maple, winged

Maple, winged,
takes flight

She said, "well...

She said, "well,
I fooled them.
I'm back".

Now,
please eat and drink more Grandma.

Raspberries

raspberries
picked under the moon with a headlamp
the next day
shared with friend

On Thursday

On Thursday, she had a Sunday breakfast.

The bird

The bird finds its way onto the page again.
It speaks--
and there are no bars
and it is pink.

The eve of a new year?

I have been scattered

I have been scattered, bits of me spread all around.
There I am in the sparkling sun,
in that bit of moon,
and there,
in the shiny ribbon caught in the wire fence.

Ode to a different time

when my grandmother knew what her bell bill was for
and went line dancing
and liked outlandish socks


___

(Grandma, I miss you.)

It is sunny and raining

It is sunny and raining at the same time.
They say, "It is possible for both."

A squirrel gather walnuts

A squirrel gathers walnuts while I sit in the sun beside a mottled, orange-leaved bush.
Perhaps we are both getting ready for winter.