Cleaning out the home office,
soothing the wrinkles from
every dear aging surface once
again, I cannot bid final adieu
to one relic after another on
my cluttered desk top, where
love struggles to reclaim loss.
Rob doused by AIDS, Irma by a
mind sputtered out, Phyllis lost
to winnowing of the spark.
If not now, when?
Heartbreaking. What do you mean ‘or Poetry Foundation’? Are you talking to them about your poetry?
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Oh, no! My memory slipped. Someone had blogged about the night and had written at d’Verse and Poetry or Poet’s —-something and I mis-remembered what the Poetry thing was. He (or she) had linked the two and I boo-booed.
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Probably Poetry Pantry. 🙂
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and/or Poets United.
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Excellently written, Nan! I especially admire the phrase “soothing the wrinkles from every dear aging surface”. I have a box of obituary/memorial “relics” that I cannot throw away…now.
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So you definitely know the feeling! Thanks.
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Love this! Love what you have been posting lately!
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Thank you! Have a good trip abroad, daughter!
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Can you ever clean out those mementos… every little piece has a story.
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Yes. But I’m leaving much too many for anyone to hang onto! : D
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Throwing things away can go to extremes. I remember going through boxes we had not unpacked for ten years after we moved to our current location. They were mostly books. Anything we were sure we weren’t going to use again either went to the recycling bin or to a thrift store. Anything we even had a doubt about we put on shelves we built in the basement. A lot was thrown away and the rest organized. We didn’t throw away any mementos. I liked the last line: “If not now, when?” Our answer was “not now. maybe later” to a lot of things we will never look at again.
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Thanks for your response, but I may be a bit closer to “later” than you! : D
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I think we are the same age, Nan….the age when we lose dear friends one by one, and consider our own mortality (if not now, when?). Your words were poignant and touching. I take each day as a gift, and rejoice in it, as it’s apparent so do you. Hail fellow, well met!
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Thanks so much for the greeting. And I find blogging can be so helpful, too.
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Those relics are so difficult to part with. I have my brothers cowboy boots, such an odd thing to hang on to, but getting rid of them seems wrong to me. Your last line resonates with me.
Thanks for joining in, Nan. Sorry for this late comment.
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And I still have the now ratty bathrobe my deceased sister gave me more than 20 years ago. Our effort to hang on is really touching, and I think it may be psychologically healthy, though perhaps inconvenient, given space requirements! Thanks for the reply. Much better late than never!
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