Author’s Note: “Revision” appears in my poetry collection, The Ledger of Mistakes (Terrapin Books, 2023), about caring for my mother during her decline and death. Having worked as a hospice chaplain, I am well aware that the death of a family member often brings up what is left unresolved. In fact, sometimes the urge to rewrite history is almost irresistible.
Revision
Because after widowhood
and a second marriage,
you had five names,
(trochees linked by single stresses)
which you tried on
like skirts, blouses, jackets,
mixing and matching
according to your mood,
for different occasions,
a pile left on the closet floor—
three of the five for your license,
a different three for taxes,
yet another three for your will—
who but I to untangle the mess
when were you gone?
Because in the end
you left it to me to decide
who you were—what name
to display I meant to say—
on the two-person headstone,
bought so long ago,
half of which
had been blank for fifty years,
I made the last edit,
struck out the final trochee,
gave you back to Daddy,
God help you.
♦
Kathy Nelson has worked as an engineer, a teacher, and a chaplain. She holds an MFA from the Warren Wilson Program for Writers and is the recipient of the 2019 James Dickey Prize for Poetry (from Five Points: A Journal of Literature and Art ) as well as a Pushcart nominee. In addition to her chapbooks, Cattails (Main Street Rag, 2013) and Whose Names Have Slipped Away (Finishing Line Press, 2017), and her forthcoming full-length The Ledger of Mistakes (see above), her work has appeared in LEON Literary Journal, New Ohio Review, Tar River Poetry, and Valparaiso Poetry Review, among others. Website: https://kathynelsonpoet.com/
The Delmarva Review, in St. Michaels, MD, gives selected writers a desirable home in print (with a digital edition) for their most compelling new prose and poetry to present to discerning audiences everywhere. It exists at a time when many commercial print publications (and literary magazines) were closing their doors or reducing literary content. For each annual edition, the editors have read thousands of submissions to select the best of new poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. About half are from the Delmarva and Chesapeake region. As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, support comes from tax-deductible contributions and a grant from Talbot Arts with funds from the Maryland State Arts Council. Website: www.DelmarvaReview.org
Wilson W Wyatt says
I always envy (in a good way) poetry with a message that resonates and conjures more thought.
From Kathy Nelson’s poem: Where does the end lead after the end? Who cares for the message’s remains, for they are the leaders of the message…the last to leave the room.