Granny's Cottage

by Sylvia Barnard

After they sold the farm, 

they moved to the main road

to a little three-bedroom house

like a hobbit house under a bank.

On the other side, my father planted 

an English-style hedge and behind

the house were big trees and my

mother's compost heap frequented by

all the little animals that still

lived along this road, avoiding the cars

whizzing past their lairs and burrows

on the way to town to get groceries.

In the summertime, we went there 

for long periods, my daughter

going to Vacation Bible School

at the Congregational Church

and playing with her third cousins

along the brook and in the woods.

~

I am a native of western Massachusetts where this poem is set and came to Albany in 1967 to teach in the Classics Department at UAlbany, which I did for 43 years. I have read and published my poetry in the area throughout that time.

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What It Means to Not Have a Grandchild

by Edie Abrams

No smooching a bellybutton.

No caressing a cheek or sniffing the scent of innocence

from the top of a head.

No holding, hugging, enfolding, rocking back-and-forth 

as if nothing else in the world exists. 

No counting fingers and toes in a warm bath 

with baby balanced against knees.

No hearing the giggles of peek-a-boo, 

that delight better than ice cream on a sweltering day. 

No reading aloud with an exaggerated “I’m coming to get you,” 

fingers spidering from toes to the Michelin Man neck. 

No singing silly songs like “Beautiful Doody” to the tune of “Beautiful

     Dreamer,” 

or the ones your Mom and Bubbe sang in Polish, German, Spanish, or

     Yiddish. 

No watching each breath when each new puff is a sign

that a robin will sing in the dawn of a new day.

~

Edie Abrams retired from the NYS Assembly 100 years ago, and has been writing poetry since she developed the typical mother-daughter relationship during her teenage years, a million years ago.

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Elegy: Shot List For An Art House Obsessive

by David Gonsalves

And what, after all, of jealousy

     the future of measurement

          a meadow that plunders the calendar

a day out of tolerance

     moon without memory

          wave after wave of oakleaf

blind eye at the edge of uncertainty

     free of what is often brilliant

          the liberation of liberation

a series of speckled rose buds

     the liveliness of even-tempered swallows

          even as protocol locks out the tide

knowing only weightless reassurance

     the need to avoid some staccato obstruction

          or fall into a featureless distance

footprints ravaged before the peat bog

     raw and inquisitive tapestries

          prelude to a dose of ambiguity

falling snow, the end of anniversaries

     the inability to understand the unrehearsed

          progression of last-ditch vanishing points

a jet stream as strange as it was simple

     glad that the body has no disregard

          a way to keep the sundial unmannered

twilight and the return of humility

     brief mastery of something delicate

          divine indifference made intelligible.

~

David Gonsalves should have been born in Nepal, but wasn't. Lives in a cave beside a river that flows both ways.

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Lust

by Elaine Kenyon

in my intention

I drive to Salem

knock on your door

let myself in

we contemplate, meditate

on the wonderment of words

their dance, delight and design

the cat purring perched and listening

you say why you liked my poems

I wrote as I read your Green Midnight

I am humbled by your sentiment

I tell you I am easily carried to comfort

with each line of your poetry

I am drawn to you 

this is not lust

this is affection

adoration

I did not take that drive

and now

there’s nothing 

but a carcass to caress

lines and curves on the page

to trace

I am emptied

~

Elaine Kenyon is the host of the 2nd Wednesday Poetry Night at the Schuylerville Public Library. She enjoys reading and listening to poetry at local open mics. She currently tutors children with dyslexia and is the owner of Olde Saratoga Literacy and Learning, LLC.

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Our NINTH annual POEM-A-DAY
celebrating National Poetry Month
opens April 1
with the first of 30 poems!
READ . . . COMMENT . . . ENJOY
and SPREAD the WORD(S)!