Sometimes it helps to learn a relative has died a close relative you haven’t seen in years and didn’t plan to see again because

When we were kids growing up in the city we had prairies and a little hill and we’d put Stevie

Do you remember how to tie a Windsor knot the way your father taught you on graduation day in eighth grade

He asked and so I told him. The “cancer” poems stem from cancer in the family. Daughter’s terminal. Son’s a five-year survivor.

Underneath the feeder black juncos write hieroglyphics in the snow. Two cardinals arrive In a flash of red. They add

There’s always something. Like the growth you found under your arm showering this morning but you decided to go

The ones we didn’t abort we’re starting to euthanize so no worries there. It’s the ones in the middle still walking around

Long article in the paper this morning stops Tim from gobbling his bacon and eggs. Bears are starving in the woods. Too many cubs, too little food.

It was stupid of Walt not to show it to Joan before they got married but he was too shy. He had no idea

Dad, happy to see you’re taking a nap. I’m down at the pier so give me a shout when you wake up

Alive just one week, the Luna moth plastered to my screen door under porch light is pale green and beautiful.

Like that broad in an apricot bra hanging over the sill of her tenement window, the sun is over me now, its nectar laughing and falling.