What we had was most of all there was.
Where the plow stops suddenly
The clank of the metal against stone
berating any melancholy.
Where the poetry runs out
sucks the breath from my lungs.
Where the words
are mere empty vessels, of use no more.
Time squandered with poetry and sadness.
The loss was not special
though she would think it so.
Maybe you would too.
Haunted dreams with half-hidden view of her face.
Her image visited in semi-sacred pews,
amid a stand of oaks marked by green-grey lichens,
in noisy airline terminals
with everyone anxiously waiting to leave.
She catches a fleeting glimpse of her loved, lost face
And then she’s gone.
Johanna Stohler is a retired high school English teacher who taught for many years at Edison High School. After retiring she taught GED classes and ESL to adults.
