Loss

All Poems, Disappointment, Emotions, Hope, Loss

Disappointment

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Disappointments are ubiquitous.

Popping up all around us like toadstools.

Some large and intrusive.

Others, small, almost unseen.

But, everyone encounters them.

At one time or another.

Remember when a friend didn’t return a call?

A dinner date, called off?

A flight, cancelled?

A movie you wanted to see, uninspiring?

Having to choose between two important events on the same date?

Can you recall the feelings set off?

Disruption of joy?

Loss, sadness?

Anger, hurt?

What do you do?

When things just don’t work out the way you wished?

It helps me to contemplate nature.

At all the seeds dropping from trees.

Never germinating.

At birds’ nests poached.

By foxes or raccoons.

At cicadas drumming.

Not finding a mate.

All creatures, human and not, suffer disappointments.

I am not the only one.

I know I’d offer compassion to another.

So, I give it to my unsettled self.

Honor the feelings.

Scattered thoughts.

Till ready to move on.

Turning them into something worthwhile.

Some action.

Maybe writing, sharing, forgiving.

Perhaps disappointment, a toll for living.

Helping us grow strong and learn.

We’ll never want for practice.

It’s everywhere we turn!

Lynn Benjamin

June 24, 2024

All Poems, Animals/Insects, Emotions, Farewell, Loss, Natural Beauty, Plants, Pleasure, Seasons

Summer Solstice Arrives

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Summer solstice arrives.

Soaring into the heart of June.

Longest day of the year.

For butterflies, bees, chipmunks.

For me.

Lover of natural illumination.

Walks at dawn and dusk.

With a Tilley hemp hat upon my head.

Tipping it to the sun.

As we tilt closer.

Like I would a glass of champagne.

Celebrating natural milestones.

Red and pink beebalm blooms.

Lips wide, enticing winged creatures.

Bright orange butterfly weed.

Beckoning monarchs, swallowtails.

Linden blooms carpeting lawns.

For queens and princesses to tread.

Mulberries hanging heavy on branches.

Staining streets as they fall.

Congregations of day lilies praying.

Tiny green lemons bursting to life.

Frogs bellowing mating calls.

Does gazing upwards quizzically.

Baby geese growing as large as parents.

Ready to take wing.

Each scene, a piece of the jigsaw.

Filling in the frame of bright June days.

Do plants and animals tire of so much light?

Are they hungrier, thirstier?

Or are they greedy like me?

Wanting to seize sunbeams?

Already sad to bid the solstice farewell.

Bit by bit what’s sunlit will fade.

As earth slips away from sun.

Shorter days bringing nighttime shade.

 

Lynn Benjamin

June 22, 2024

All Poems, Emotions, Family, Grandchildren, Loss, Stories

Easy to Forget

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It’s easy to forget.

The longing eleven-year-olds have for companionship.

Yearning for company of family members.

Before the adolescent push for friends.

Elias articulated wishes to be with parents, siblings.

Disappointment when they, occupied with work or school.

Or social media or sleep.

So, Bob and I, grandparents, seized every second of each moment.

To spend time with him.

During his short foray here.

On Shavuot while his mother worked.

Enjoying meals together on the deck, in the atrium.

Making protein shakes.

Taking him to exercise classes.

Miniature golf, the supermarket.

Meandering the neighborhood.

Seeking foxes, deer, bunnies.

Hummingbirds, butterflies.

Watering the garden.

Listening endlessly.

To what he’s learned.

Science, economics, botany.

Observations about the world.

Worries about personal maladies.

Most of all, his desires.

To hang out with parents, siblings.

In these days of hustle bustle,

when everyone’s plugged in,

hard to find time and space

to bond with closest kin.

Familial hungering, sad.

Though grandparents fill holes,

the child knows those he really wants,

and itemizes woes.

Lynn Benjamin

June 14, 2024

All Poems, Animals/Insects, Emotions, Food, Humor, Loss, Stories

Day of Lamentation

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It was a day of lamentation.

Rabbits ate the peas. The deer, cucumbers, eggplants.

Bob intoned at intervals.

Punctuated by, it makes me sad.

It’s true, he worked hard potting those plants.

In tidy rows outback.

Where, in years past, no animals bothered them.

But, once he put peas downstairs, they lured other forest friends.

So, by the end of the day, his crops, nearly decimated.

So, too, his spirits.

Which he soothed, shelling peas.

Picked up this morning at a local farmer’s market.

Also, by harvesting the first purslane.

Grown on the deck above the pillaged produce.

Then serving peas, purslane with dinner outside.

Listening to avian concerts.

Ignoring the garlic and rotten egg odor.

Laid down below to repel deer.

Then taking a walk through perfumed lanes.

Honeysuckles, magnolias, Japanese lilacs.

Instant aha in nature’s hall.

In the scheme, what’s lost is small.

Did you hear the sacred call?

Give the hungry green coleslaw!

 

Lynn Benjamin

June 2, 2024

 

 

Aging, All Poems, Change, Cousins, Emotions, Family, Gardens, Health/Illness, Loss, Regret, Stories

Sitting with Libby

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I’m glad we went to see Libby today, said Bob.

Bustling around the kitchen.

Reflecting on the afternoon.

I’m glad we visited, too.

A chance to sit outside with her.

Under Japanese lilacs.

Perfuming breezes.

Sneaking through open doors to sweeten corridors.

In the residence where she now resided.

It was peaceful.

Not a word about politics.

Conviction of Trump.

Just being together in the garden.

Three of us, alone.

Talking about her soon-to-be ninety-first birthday.

Her new great grandson.

Mention of him filling her eyes with tears.

Scrolling photos on her phone.

Stopping at azaleas outside her former home.

Pictures, she requested from her son.

Still living there.

Blooming bushes, a place, a season she misses.

Trading them for needed care.

Knowing the choice, right.

But wistful for what she left behind.

We sat in shade.

Just present with each other.

I, commenting on her pink nails, short haircut.

Simple, unhurried conversation.

Plying her about my maternal grandparents.

Her aunt and uncle.

Whom she knew growing up.

But who didn’t survive past my second year.

She, the last link in the family to remember them.

My turn to feel melancholy.

Not getting to know them.

I wish my parents told me more.

Or maybe I hadn’t heard.

Tenuous my history.

Who’s left to pass on the word?

 

Lynn Benjamin

June 1, 2024

Aging, All Poems, Birthdays, Change, Friendship, Loss, Memories

Discovery and Rediscovery

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How do you feel when you discover something?

Something novel?

A new place, new food?

New word, new flower?

Perhaps it spices up your life.

Gives you a sense of adventure.

Animates, enlivens.

Tickles the spirit.

What about rediscovery?

Something you knew in the past?

Lost, misplaced, forgot about?

A recipe, book?

Song, photo?

Perhaps a person?

Someone you lost touch with?

For the hustle bustle of life.

Career, marriage, childrearing.

And, then, reconnected with.

Finding out you still had much in common.

Adolescent memories.

Values, opinions, perspectives.

Even birthdays.

Exactly one week apart.

A fact I held onto for decades.

After going our separate ways.

Always remembering my friend’s birthday.

Acknowledging it in silence.

Even when apart.

Mourning the loss.

But, also, honoring her, the past relationship.

Despite disconnection.

So, when this year, I could offer her birthday wishes, I did.

Putting a bounce in my step.

Lightening each breath.

Feeling blessed in older age,

rediscovering a person dear.

Now we’ve found each other,

not possible to disappear.

 

Lynn Benjamin

June 7, 2024

All Poems, Death, Family, In-laws, Loss, Love, Stories

It Was Simple

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It was simple, the unveiling.

Four of us.

Come to honor Ethel.

Her daughter from Atlanta.

Despite illness, pain.

Needing wheelchairs in the airport.

Making the trip with her husband.

To reveal the stone.

Ethel’s son and I.

Meeting them at the cemetery.

Removing gauze.

To exhibit the plaque.

Designed by Ethel.

Long before she passed.

Review the original gilt words:

Kindred Spirits Me and Thee

In Life and in Eternity.

Binding her to Mac.

Each relishing a second chance at marital love.

Until Mac departed nineteen years later.

We studied details.

Like we would a sculpture.

Glad the display outdoors.

In the thick of Spring.

When gardens overflowed with azaleas, irises, columbines.

Trees hung heavy with lilacs, empress blooms, honeysuckle.

Aromas luring Ethel’s spirit toward us.

Under cypresses.

For she, too, wanted to see the piece.

Marking her resting place.

Was it done correctly?

Everything in order?

Reminding us that GiGi referred to great-grandmother.

Title earned later in life.

Her energy picking up like wind.

Eager to chime in familial anecdotes.

We circled around to listen

till Linda’s hands, chilled.

Then we bid farewell,

conversation stilled.

Lynn Benjamin

May 16, 2024

All Poems, Family, Loss, Parents, Politics, Prose/memoir

What Would my Father Say this Memorial Day?

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My thoughts drift to my father on many occasions.

His birthday, yahrzeit.

Father’s Day, wedding anniversary.

Certainly, Memorial Day.

Designated to honor generations of veterans.

Sacrificing life and limb for our nation.

My father flew a B-24 during World War II.

Helping to liberate France.

Defeat Hitler.

End the Holocaust.

Maintain freedom against fascism, autocracy.

Allowing his children to grow up believing in democracy.

In certain inalienable rights.

Each person, equal.

No person above the law.

Life, liberty, pursuit of happiness.

What would my father say today?

If he could see democracy at risk?

Threats to abandon established governmental norms?

Like peaceful transfer of power?

Corruption in the Supreme Court?

A presidential candidate indicted on eighty-eight felony counts?

Overturn of Roe v Wade?

Rampant anti-Semitism?

What would my father say?

To officials conspiring to steal elections?

Undermine the balance of power?

Disadvantage swaths of voters?

Demand loyalty to party over Constitution?

What would my father say to me, my siblings?

Would he rail and holler?

Roll his eyes, shrug?

This man, whose parents fled Russia.

To rear family without fear, in safety.

From persecution, pogroms.

What would my father say?

For his wise words, I yearn.

I suppose I’ll never hear them.

It’s time I take my turn.

 

Lynn Benjamin

May 27, 2024

Yahrzeit is the anniversary of the death of a loved one.

 

All Poems, Animals/Insects, Change, Death, Emotions, Loss

What Happened?

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What happened? I wondered.

Passing the pond.

Where the gosling drifted, dead.

What happened?

Did it hit its head upon a rock?

While jumping into the water?

Had it taken ill?

Perhaps ingesting poison?

Was it weaker than the other chicks?

Less healthy?

What happened?

I’ll never know.

Only that Mama and Papa carried on with their brood.

Now five instead of six.

Strolling further away.

As another drama unfolded.

Four large geese flapping down.

Hovering close by.

Grandparents? Aunts? Uncles?

Come to pay condolence visits?

Honking, squawking only feet from the pond.

A scene I do not pretend to understand.

Only sure of my own sadness

upon seeing that fuzzy form

floating in chilly waters.

Only yesterday, vital, warm.

 

Lynn Benjamin

May 2, 2024

 

Aging, All Poems, Change, Friendship, Loss, Natural Beauty, Time, Worry

Peace Lily Unfurling

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The peace lily, unfurling.

In time to reveal serenity to the people who sent it.

Just over a year ago.

Marking the loss of Bob’s mother.

Unbeknownst to them, a few days before unveiling her stone.

Strange, these coincidences.

Surprising us like that.

Also, bringing joy.

On re-encounter at the very moment of bloom.

Framed by two flowering trees just outside the window.

Empress and honeysuckle.

Both diffusing perfumes into the room.

Where we four sit.

Face to face.

Breaking bread.

Sprinting after conversations.

Like intellectual athletes.

Literature, politics, travel.

Finally, acknowledging the shadow.

Looming over us all.

The what next?

How do you prepare for the unknown?

Rely on your parents’ experiences?

Take advice from middle-aged children?

Wait till the unexpected pushes you?

Or prepare in anticipation?

Stay in place?

Move to smaller quarters?

Who has the right answer?

When possibilities endless, overwhelming.

Just hard to fathom our story ends

like any good novel or play.

What fortune to have a hand in it.

To mold like a piece of clay.

 

Lynn Benjamin

May 8, 2024