Yesterday Was Thanksgiving

By the time it was dark 

my bones ached 

from pulling away from the loneliness 

of the missing voices

You would not imagine I would feel so acutely 

Richard whose old time eccentricities stood in front of the kindest heart

Jean who wrote back on Facebook but was my actual cousin

Nance who texted me more days than not

My family who had died off since Spring 

One of my daughters who cut me away is not unreachable 

I could call her 

but to what end she would only tell me how hideous I am

who would walk into that smoke filled wilderness 

Still I ache for her there

The other, one never knows what broken glass litters the ground between us

I would pick it all up but she keeps it there like curls of razor wire where she could choose rosemary and sage to line her path

This morning the Thanksgiving table still set with French linens

protea and eucalyptus in the vase from Amsterdam 

candles wrapped in birch bark or tall in copper stands like stems of winter 

Outside there are horizontal icicles on the fountain

I cut a slice of pastry ate it with salted nuts

There is a necklace I began and will finish perhaps today

Not sure who it is for 

But it is for someone 

There is still love in my world 

deep snow on distant peaks 

rivers run with fallen leaves

it is all there 

just as brown leaves cling still to the oak tree

undetached despite every sighing wind