Me and Mary and my awful terrible
2020 original poetry
It was a daily occurrence since first day
of 2020
Not in a mentor student relationship
but friend to friend mutually shared
Exhilaration
I’d write a poem and post first thing
each morning
Mary would email back
with personal thoughts or
constructive feedback
Letting me know this project
meant as much to her as it did to me
No holds barred
no restrictions
no taboo topics
On either of our parts
Only rule was to be Honest
confront the elephants in the rooms
Seek to resolve the elephants
free them from their confining rooms
Do for others what they will not
do for themselves
Heal the brokenhearted & bind their wounds
(Psalm 147:3)
We found ways for the universal & the personal
Bared our souls
Explored our innermost feelings
our broken hearts
our seeping wounds
our terrors from the outside world
the fears realized in politics & protests
And all that coronavirus stuff
Thoughtful meditations on life
& loves & families & friends
The gifts we receive
The gifts we bring
We both brought much to the table
Often all of all we had to bring.
We sought to rise above the mundane & banal
To find wonder in each thought
cares & concerns & angers exposed
Relentlessly explored & discussed
in the open honest truthful ways
most poets most often do
360 original pieces shared
before the events of
that fateful weekend
One of the last pieces was a harbinger
I wrote this for Thanksgiving Day 2020
Four days before her passing
my deepest depths already felt her
slipping away
I wanted her to know how
strongly her absence would be felt
I’m fairly certain she got the message
in the open honest truthful spirit in words
We shared every single morning in
awful terrible 2020
Take care, dear one, Amsterdam hoist beams
are unable to bear
weight of my heavy heart
—Frank Key