RENTAL
PROPERTY
An old apartment,
In someone or other’s
mews:
Years of cooked
vegetables
Linger in darkened
grout.
Screwing a curtain
rod
Into soft
wood:
Too many
people
Have already lived
here
- Robert Demaree 2012
IN THE CHAPEL
1.
A
funeral today at Golden Pines,
The
chapel full,
Amber afternoon light across
Crimson-cushioned pews.
The
elderly receive familiar texts,
Celebrate a life, mourn a loss.
We
knew almost everyone there,
Which was part of why I wept.
2.
A
year later, at 92, he wed again,
Perhaps as she had planned,
His
bride a widower’s widow:
To
affirm a way of living,
To
affirm the act of living.
- Robert Demaree 2012
CARRIERS
Morning walk at Golden Pines:
Late
February sky deep blue
Through trees for now still leafless
But
about to change their minds.
A
moving van packs up the contents of a cottage,
Fewer since her husband died,
And
takes them to Assisted Living,
As
if there were some other kind.
Across the pond, the hink and honk of geese,
Heading north, programmed to care for their
own.
An
ambulance pulls slowly away
From
the Health
Care Building
Siren, blue lights turned off.
- Robert Demaree 2012
“Carriers” first appeared in
Tipton Poetry Journal Winter 2009.
Robert Demaree is the author of four collections of
poems, including Fathers and Teachers
(2007) and Mileposts (2009), both
published by Beech River Books. The winner of the 2007 Conway, N.H., Library
Poetry Award, he is a retired school administrator with ties to North Carolina,
Pennsylvania and New Hampshire in the eastern U.S. He has had over 600 poems
published or accepted by 125 periodicals in the U.S., Australia, Canada and the
U.K., including Cold Mountain Review, Red Wheelbarrow, miller’s pond, Bolts of
Silk, Louisville Review and Paris/Atlantic, and in four anthologies including
the 2008 and 2010 editions of Poet’s
Guide to New Hampshire and Celebrating Poets over 70.. For further
information see http://www.demareepoetry.blogspot.com
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