4/30

Faith finds me with a phone call to come to dinner.

Faith surrounded by family, those close always, others in from afar.

Faith supports me.

4/29

This morning watch Hope's horses in her yard, nice work.

Then an afternoon with Hope and lunch and friends.

I feel hope.

4/28

Your friends, our friends, took me under their roof,

Now only my friends, wrap in sweet concern and care,

Give me calm.

4/27

I stay at a dear friends, pastimes I would call you goodnight,

Now I have no one to call and in this oh familiar place,

I feel alone.

With the spring outside, chooks running and turkeys sitting,

Sheep and flowers , food so good and these friends conversing

I feel comfort.

4/26

On this day of your birth I offer a prayer I found

In an old 1887 newspaper, which stated: At the grave of a noted Osage,

the Indians looked to the sun and prayed:

Jesus give him a fine woman and many ponies;

Give him plenty of trinkets and a good gun;

Give him lot of fun and no bad recollections.

Jesus give him all the good in your country.

My Dear, God give you fine ponies

To ride the skies Charles Russell paints;

Sweet rest, joy, lots of fun and no bad recollections.

Wait for your woman.

Death leaves a heartache no one can heal

Love leaves a memory no one can steal.

4/25

Woke to gray skies amd rain over Flood Creek,

To waters we once watched wrapped in the nearness of each.

Now I watch alone.

Woke to knowing you and knowing this mid-day

I would wake you beyond my reach, but not beyond my love.

I love you.

The skies' tears did hold and on the banks of that quiet creek

Came so many to speak sweetly of you and to remember you,

To cry, to laugh.

We met by the hayfields of the neighboring farm to ours.

Mid morning some on the dock were fly fishing the serene waters

For the tables, others gathered spring flowers.

Under a tent, banners fluttering, we came to speak respect for My Dear

With love, compassion, honor. Voices, guitar, rising gently in song.

Cowboy poetry leading us on.

We spoke of his generosity, his kindness, his enthusiasm. For what

Brought him joy, his dedication to endeavors he found worthy,

Of the loyalty he gave his friends.

We remembered his humor,

Which he did share with many, with words of love, tinged

Joyful and sad.

I did speak of this man I love, of the life we shared.

I do not know, Jack, how you were there, but for how

My heart felt.

I did not see the deer cross the lawns,

As I spoke of your mornings out in our fields,

Nor the eagle soaring up by the sun.

I did not see, as I spoke of your carving, five geese fly up from the creek,

Where we had so loved watching them. "Jack's Flight!" whispered

the Navy pilots, among our friends.

White wings of a butterfly brushed by me seen only by our friends. But,

I did see your friends, your colleagues, felt love from those distant,

Bringing a sense of serenity.

I lifted my voice to you. It is an ending and I am sad beyond all aching.

Others did welcome the memory of you into their hearts.

Mine will long ever.

4/24

I sit at our neighbor's table, surrounded by friends

Who so completely have taken on seeing you are honored.

It is a blessing

Far beyond any I, or you, would ever have hoped.

These people, who so thoroughly embody the meaning of friend,

I am thankful.

Tomorrow I will suit myself simply in earthen linen and black,

Suit myself in memory of love wrapped with a scarf of blue,

A gift given hug.

4/23

First friends arrive, congenial, as I need to learn to be

When entering another's home as honored guest,

I pay heed

As she joins, graciously, into the sweet hearted company gathered

To give us welcome, warmth, good food; giving herself with kindness

To their attention.

4/22

Today we cleaned prepared, Nadine and I, as the tent rose,

Reiny knelt on his bad knees pulling weeds, listening to our chatter

About friends we knew.

The welcome, the care, these sweet people have given

That we may have one last day where others can one last time

Surround us.

I anticipate a joyful feeling of having a sense of you.

You surrounding me through voices of other, but not the forever

Loss the day's end portends.

4/21

This morning I did pack that black suit and another.

Left the dogs and drove cross state to finally

Turn down our old road

The rain let off and our friends not yet home

I sat on their dock, one up from ours, by quiet green waters

Wishing for you.

4/20

Hands work at gathering mementos of out time

And I am drawn remembering

And crying.

4/19

I feel I am not gathering things for a memorial for you alone.

I feel I am losing grip on a tether, a connection, life, my life,

Oh our life.

4/18

Clean what? What for? Why am I doing any of this?

Who cares if I neaten or cook or straighten, try to make pleasing?

Who really cares?

4/17

I want next weekend that people come, many, to honor you.

Fill each other with the joy they had knowing you, show they care.

What I want is you.

4/16

The footing under my heels is water slick stone

And my feet are clad in smooth leather slippers

Ready ever to fall.

4/15

Some days the quiet is reassuring and I glide,

Some what, easily through them, only to come a cropper

On heartache.

Some days are only an incessant wearing of grief

On a soul hard placed by the abyss barely standing,

Consumed with unremitting woe.

4/14

Under sheets cool and weightless, I lie sleepless and too tired.

No one to hold me encompassed in body warmth, only alone

Cloaked in grief.

4/13

I am alone, confused, heartbroken, unsettled and sad beyond tears.

For my failings, I can not consider tears a comfort opened to me.

I did fail to recognize

Jack was not well, I have paid so dearly for that.

Will have that lading ever on my soul. I failed and will need

To learn to live with that.

4/12

A dear friend will also soon have a similar procedure

With better doctors, better care, better outcome

And come home.

4/11

Sometimes I live in the country.

Sometimes I live in town. Sometimes I take a great notion

To jump in that river and drown.

4/10

Spent a few hours shooting with our friend,

His quiet word guided me, breathe slowly out, stilling thoughts to you.

I shot well.

4/9

How does one negotiate this life alone?

Really, must I accept loneliness as bosom close?

Ah, time slowed.

4/8

Tonight I have laid aside your watch, laid it aside well my finding.

In some ways as others will lay you aside after the end of this month.

I will, can, not.

Tonight I must lay near my heart truths, wishfulness will lead me astray

There is no one but me will get me through this morass, mine alone

To traverse, to decide a path.

But tonight, friends, dear, do help me navigate this muddle.

Some by lending their strength, others by stating their limits.

I have both.

4/7

Lent a helping hand, load horses, grass cut. house cleaned

People come and go, bells of arrival, I await Joel's, your dear friend.

I give that such weight now.

4/6

A friend says he is done mourning you and on a level I can not reach

I do understand. He chooses to remember you with love and fondness.

Chooses now to go on.

Reminding me of all I will never have with you.

That others, too, will go on, leaving you, leaving you, how, leaving you

And I alone.

4/5

Driving solo is a way of using time, a shallow use for sure.

For awareness must attend the task, leaving contemplation to shoal

Lightly on the surface.

4/4

This sunday morning up early to ride a friend's half-bad mare.

We cover half her 300 acres of mountain pasture as the sun rose,

Not a half-bad way to spend an Easter.

4/3

You would have gladly gone to this wedding, met this bride

One of your boys steps onward in his life, he will learn life entwined.

I miss so not being at your side.

Our gift to him, a painting in a frame, created by us, and your words,

Your offering to your father, dear love, and perhaps, memory of us

Standing always together.

4/2

Long drives and snarled traffic, so what. What does destination mean?

Who will really care if I arrive? There or home, what is home now?

You are not there.

Long drives allow for tears to freely fall.

4/1

Morning slips in quietly, a soft haze over the hayfields.

A cat sleeps nestled by me in this bed too empty.

No joke.