A time for poetry...

03.18.2009

When my cousin, Zony, died November of last year, I felt compelled to write her a poem, if only to vent my sadness. We’ve not seen each other for almost 30 years, I believe, since she left to work as a nurse in the U.S. I have many fond memories of our childhood together.

Here is that poem:

To Zony

Farewell, friend and loved one,
You left while
Some of us were having fun,
And others were
Uncertain of their tomorrows.
They all come back, overwhelmingly,
In torrents and waves,
Memories of long ago, faint
But comfortably familiar:
The afternoon games we thought
Were endless,
The beetles, the cicadas, the grasshoppers, the frogs,
The tin can phones, the rusty tricycle,
Our "Sound of Music" choir
In falsetto voices,
And Denny's black and red
Chinese checkers chips
Which I stole and hid
But for which deed I was found out!
The years and wants and needs
Took their toll on ties,
But you were just there, even
Just thousands of miles far,
But you were there, as you have
Always been tucked away
In my mind and heart.