You text asking me
to pick up lettuce
on my way home.
There in produce
I glance over at the flowers
and remember,
you adore tulips,
love their bright heads
atop crisp uniforms.
Then I recall
your shelf of vases,
all slender vessels,
each waiting.
Standing and gazing
at the beauty on display,
I finally hear
your quiet asking.
I pick a clutch of tulips
in tongue pink
to fill an empty vase
and more.
gone and come has year LexPomo another
pleasure a been has it
poems your read to inspiring been has it
art your sharing for you thank
writing keep please
precious is voice your
bye bye
Thirteen years he’s walked beside me—
not always ahead, not always behind— just there,
steady as breath on a cold Kentucky morning.
He was there when the house was loud with fear
and I tried to outrun the bottle without breaking the glass.
He was there when we moved to that strange town,
and the cancer came like a stranger with a key to our life.
He watched while I made a job out of pretending to be okay,
and then sat quietly when I wasn’t.
He was there when my husband died—
when I looked out at the world
and couldn’t tell where the land ended
and the loss began.
He stood guard as I took care of my mother—
as her memory left in pieces
and I had to hold together what the illness tore apart.
He never looked away.
Not once.
He waited while I held hands that went cold,
kept watch through nights
when grief was the only thing moving,
hiked beside me when my heart was too heavy to carry on its own.
When a new love found me, he accepted the change
like old spirits do—
with quiet understanding.
He stood with us at Anglin Falls,
watched the vows without blinking or barking.
Wore his title—Dog of Honor— like he was born for it.
He attended the wedding luncheon on the patio of Boone Tavern,
sniffed every corner of celebration as if joy were a scent
he could finally breathe again.
And now, this cursed morning, I call the vet.
I make the appointment.
The kindest,
cruelest
thing I have ever done.
He’s hurting.
His body betrays the soul still alert in his eyes.
And I owe him
what he’s always given me—
dignity,
gentleness,
release.
No one tells you that the greatest love
sometimes ends with a phone call,
a circle on a calendar,
a soft blanket
in a quiet room.
But this is how
I say thank you—
with tears,
with trembling,
with every fiber of me that wishes I could give him
even one day as loyal,
as healing,
as full of grace
as the life he gave me.
Some say
he’ll cross the rainbow bridge.
I don’t know.
But I do know
he already carried me across it
a hundred times.
And next week,
I will carry him there
for he no longer can walk.
Hand on his fur.
Heart breaking,
but whole
because of him.
Maybe I’m a good woman.
Maybe there never was another I wanted more.
And maybe the face you still want me to kiss
wasn’t made to look like wind strewn sand
by sun and Winstons.
Maybe I don’t suffer to be your release
when I am made arid by your indifference.
And maybe, as I clean our clothes, wash our dishes
you really wish to free me from my chains
but you gave me plain stoneware dishes
for our anniversary,
said they reminded you of me
and as I stand here over sink and drain
sending remains of our day into kitchen purgatory
I think
maybe these dishes never wanted to be clean
empty.
I think these dishes would tell me this –
they are happiest
fulfilling their mandate to serve –
what they are told they were created for.
Maybe I should feel guilt
washing away their life their dreams
of who they are or could be.
Maybe
who they are to others is invisible unless
empty.
Can’t you feel the weight of them
and their fragility at the same time?
It is their fate to gather all that this world
will make them hold and cling to its remains –
this purpose wiped clean every night
then imprisoned in a dark place until
awakened
again again again
until lost or broken.
Maybe I’m a good woman
maybe
and maybe a good woman would drop them
enjoy the sound of their breakdown
the scream of shattered stoneware madness
that would free her at last
Materials
15ft Cypress Vats (by height)
2ft Limestone Walls (by thickness)
20ft Copper Pot Stills (by height)
1 White Oak Barrel, never used
1 Glass Bottle
Ingredients
Water, Limestone Filtered
Yeast (proprietary)
>51% Yellow Dent Corn
To Taste Malt Barley, Rye, Wheat (optional)
Timing
10min Barrel Toast
25s Barrel Char
6hrs Mash Cook
7 days Fermentation
3x Distilled
5-7yrs Aged in Barrel
Instructions
1. Cook Mash
2. Ferment
3. Distill
4. Barrel
5. Age (steam cycle as needed)
6. Barrel Finish (if desired)
7. Bottle
8. Enjoy Responsibly
Grief has made my world darker for a time
I have lost a huge part of my family,
someone who left this world way too early
I have felt some guilt about not being about
not being able to stop it
I have felt overwhelmed by the strong emotions
that such a loss entails
and the world has felt so much less beautiful
without my beloved Josh in it
But God has held me close in his arms
and sent friends and family to me,
when I thought I would drown
in my own sorrow
God has given me words to write and express
the pain and sorrow that I have felt
that I could not express orally
I could literally not form sentences
to say what I have been able to write
I think that has helped me so much,
to be able to get the pain from my heart
onto the page
I have attempted to write every day for a month
and I did not succeed, but being able
to write at all is a HUGE accomplishment
I WILL not beat myself up for not doing it every
day, I WILL be grateful that I have this outlet when
there have been times in the past that grief has
dried up my words and I was not able to write at all
Poetry is a lovely part of my life, but my poetry
has not been lovely lately, it has been raw and
emotional and full of pain and loss
but it has calmed my soul and heart in a way
that nothing else has
I am grateful for poetry in my life
I am grateful for people following my painful journey
by reading my poetry
and I am grateful for everyone in my life
who has reached out to help me in my
time of sorrow
Most of all, I am grateful that I have faith
and I am surrounded by people that love me
and most of all God’s love and care
that has kept me breathing, living, and writing
In a gray Airbnb in Topeka that smells of old cigarettes and fried food,
I’m trying not to cry in the early morning. I put on a Spotify mellow mix playlist,
start to stretch on the gray floor. I hear the gray rain coming down and click through
a list of mindfulness steps to pull my awareness away from the giant, screaming
pain in my chest. I try to think about our route westward, the Brown v Board of Education
National Parks museum that we’ll go to once everyone wakes up and packs,
what kind of poem I might find there as a white woman. And I look up to see
the beige sign on the gray wall, a big fake wood cutout circle that says Yay! You’re here.
And I am. I am in this floor in Topeka. My love and the children are sleeping, ready
to float along on the itinerary I have chiseled out for us. Yay! You’re here.
I am. All the doors in my head bursting open and slamming shut, rapidfire.
My heart like a pot of thick oatmeal when the hidden depths get so hot
it creates a pocket of boiled-off vapor, and when it’s finally strong enough,
it bubbles up and splatters thick oats everyway, scalding anyone
who happens to be near. Yay! You’re here. I am, and though I am not good,
I am better. And that is worth a cheap celebration in gray Kansas.
