Eleanor eats Mom cooked

Eleanor hums when she eats 

she likes to eat tomatoes 

and plums 

and bananas 

and anything we are eating 

her fingers are starting  to work 

like they are supposed to 

thumb and forefinger teaming up 

to pick up the bits of food on her tray 

all the while she hums voice going up and down

so there 

my mother used to hum when she cooked 

she liked to make bread 

and food like chicken 

and verenike

her hands expertly forming the dough 

and handling the meat 

all the while she hummed hymns in her happy place 

so there 

Agnus Dei (Elegy Brenda Suderman 1961-2026)

not originally an Agnus Dei
but simply adagio for strings 
adapted for choir 
but so truly fits the Agnus Dei 
that it just hangs there 
pregnant with sadness 

and we sit there
in the church in sadness 
mourning this writer creator friend 
who we knew so 
young 
unsure of where her life would take her 
but passionate about making a difference 
which she did over and over 
again as we sit here and think thoughts 
that hang in the air
too soon   

Reinland excursion

baby Eleanor slept all the way there 

and then woke up 

hottest afternoon of the year 

but when we stepped into the barn’s thick walls

it was cooler 

Eleanor in Oma’s arms 

we looked around 

at tools and stables 

and then went into the attached house 

where my great grandparents lived for thirty years or so 

then Taunte Marie lived for another 40 years 

her kind presence permeated the house

and yard 

and ample garden 

we lived in the house and furnishings 

baby in arms smiling 

and looking at everything 

and everyone 

she has a stake in this house-barn 

which will remain for many years 

showing the way 

of the quiet in the land

Dug Folk Fest 26 #1

hard banjo
smooth
old finger picked guitar
steel  National
gravel voices
old songs

I'm not much

I’m not much of a deipnosophist—

I sit and listen to better table-talkers

I might look lost in a funk,

but I’m just watching the board

tracking every conversational

checkmate and zugzwang

not antisocial, nor a solivagant,

just solving puzzles with pizzazz—

the crossword’s clues feeding me

new words to keep me quiet-busy

some might call it sniffishness

but they’d be wrong

I’ll speak my mind one-on-one

it's only in a crowd I clam up—

the tiny bones in my ear vibrating

to a silent ululation

Joel jokester

he loves to tell a joke

in high school, he’d laugh and sway

until he was sick with humour

breathless in the hallway

now he starts every talk the same

have you heard the one about...

the latest headline a political name

Trump or a scandal

he speaks of the world and current events

then shifts to a song perfectly on key

his fingers find the chords by instinct

shaping the air with a melody

he’s the first at the door of the hospital room

bringing the light when the walls are grey

armed with a joke to scatter the gloom

and chase the heavy silence away

a lifelong friend

I’ve heard them all and I’ve heard that 

snow falls in March

snow falls in March

it might melt tomorrow

but for now all is covered 

in white like the flesh of this apple I’m eating 

so sweet like our granddaughter 

who looks at her mother and smiles 

when she wakes up from her nap 

sleeping like a bear hibernating 

in winter with snow covering 

his den until it melts in March