The Twenty-second Poem August 28, 2022
Why do I lie awake at midnight
after a mere four hours of sleep
and by day sleep grabs me before
I can stop it, without reason or
explanation? I try reading and
that occasionally works, but
my mind likes to be preoccupied,
There are mysteries with aging.
Generally, I’m doing well, but
there are those puzzles to which
I have no answers or remedies.
The Twenty-first Poem August 21, 2022
The fragile human body! It can
seem tough, but it turns out to be
breakable, Not long ago I broke
three toes. I’ve fallen on my head,
half in/half out of the chicken coop,
or backwards at the sink. I’ve
learned to catch myself before I
fall, and even go months without
falling. And walk short distances
with no cane or walker. Yet I live
now knowing I can fall so easily,
so without warning. It’s part of
aging, living with this unpredictability.
We do heal. Once I got a black eye,
when I couldn’t stop running and
had to fall to stop myself. And then
I couldn’t get up. People around
me worry I’ll do it again. Never
intended, always unexpected.
My doctor calls me “Trouble.”
Yet she defends me to my son:
“It’s how she does as well as
she does.” Despite my falls,
I thrive.
The Twentieth Poem August 14, 2022
As I get older, I find myself
entranced with photos of babies,
especially with photos of myself
from that beginning .Both my
grandfathers took photos of me
at my beginning, caught my smiles,
my surprise when a camera
appeared beside my bed. I seem
to remember that crib. where I
slept in my grandparents’ house.
Not long after, I have a memory
of snow, my father and I with a
yardstick, which went down into
the snow, down, down, and I
knew my father loved me. He
had, by then, a new job in Ithaca,
New York. Another photo shows
him holding me, with my mother
on the other side, and I was
pointing my finger at my grandfather
as he snapped the photo, its being
clear that he loved me, too. Lucky
baby, so surrounded by love, so
safe. I think of all the years that
followed and the love that held
me safe for the rest of
my long life.
The Nineteenth Poem August 7, 2022
They came in all shapes
and sizes. Only one seemed
happy to be here. And she
started a garden. She liked
taking Sophie out. Another
one took over sorting my
books: ones I’d keep and
ones I’d give away. A
Young one liked to clean.
Our household is rahter
informal, but we look better
than we once did. I became
eligi le for help from Medicaid
and they sent me a woman
who talked on her phone
no magger what else she was
doing. She went through the
motions but unenthusiastically.
I asked for someone else.
The next one worked quietly
and hard. She would do what
i asked, but she never smiled.
Finally she said she wouldn’t
be back. She had another job.
A new person would come
on Monday. What would
she be like? Heaven knows?
The Eighteenth Poem July 31, 2022
And then I fell. Backwards.
as I stood by the stove,
measuring out the ginger
root, the water running to
fill the big stew pot, and I
pulled off the oven door,
trying to stop myself. I hadn’t
fallen since April. I was proud
of my no-fall record. I sat up
but couldn’t see where I could
pull myself back up. So I pressed
the button on my new medical
alert I now wear all the time.
A voice asked, “What is wrong,
Judy?” I said, “I fell and can’t
get up, and the water is running.”
I had just finished setting up my
Life Station for emergencies.
It took awhile, but then i heard
the words “Help is on the way.”
It took awhile, but then a man
came in through the front door.
He understood how to get the
door key. I said, “Turn off
the water. I was afraid the water
would overflow the sink. It didn’t.
It went down the drain. He got me
to my feet and backed me to a
chair. Then he said, “Don’t move,”
went to get his case and checked
my vitals. Janet arrived and sat
down and watched. My blood
pressure was up, but it slowly
came down. I was shaking and
couldn’t stop. “Do you want
to go to the hospital?” “No.”
Janet stayed until he left and
I stopped shivering. My son Tim.
arrived. He’d been farther away.
Then Janet went back to her work.
I was fine.
The Seventeenth Poem July 24, 2022
The roosters crowing, the sky
still dark. How do they know
the light is coming? Is it my
light when I take away the
shadows and reveal the kitchen,
the bread knife, and the tea cup,
the honey jar and spoon, when
I rejoice at being awake again
on a Sunday poem morning?
The words start before I finish
my bread and butter. My body
has little aches, more twinges
when I lift my arms. Whatever
inside me is still asleep, wakes
now to hear the rooster’s
announcement of a new day.
Judy and Mikhail some years ago in Kostroma, Russia
The Sixteenth Poem July 17, 2022
When I want to sleep and can’t,
I eat a midnight snack, then wait
for sleep to take me. It will come,
but I don’t know when or why it
waits so long. Sometimes I make
, myself remember when my new
beloved used love words in another
language that I didn’t know, yet
I was sure he loved me. That
unexpected love that held me up,
that took me over. We both wanted
to live in a small house in the
forest. He said one day we’d each
have a wing and fly sosmewhere
together. He left me. It will be
my turn next. I’m glad I’m still
alive and sleep still comes. One
day death, too, will arrive, and we’ll
fly as one, as two, joined at last.
