"My Last Summer with Dad, 2023" by Annie Powell Stone

Dad was on the couch, mostly starving to death in front of us cancer, stage IV (for this type, many don’t catch the earlier stages, and of course there aren't later ones) we hung pinecone bird feeders close to the house, bringing Nature near when he couldn't go out we talked about our shared favorites: the praying mantis, female cardinal, blue herons, black cats we talked about Chris Christie taking a swing at the Bully, about what the hell would make someone crazy enough to walk into North Korea we talked about how to take care of mom where to find the passwords, who to trust we talked about the final moment and how I might not make it (I did, he waited) we talked about how a summer would never be enough time, as the days stretched out my son, his namesake, waited in the cherry tree ————————————– Annie Powell Stone called us from Baltimore, MD. voicemailpoems.org/submit/ facebook.com/voicemailpoems x.com/voicemailpoems bsky.app/profile/voicemailpoems.bsky.social instagram.com/voicemailpoems