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In the first collection of her poetry, spanning over 50 years of work from Mississippi to Washington, D.C. to Cuba to the western states, poet and activist Loretta Strharsky writes of the quiet beauty of nature, personal relationships, and socio-political dynamics, giving voice to the unheard and unseen.
Questioning Still
This pain never goes away, does it?
I hope for blurs, maybe forget the exact date to keep the vividness at bay.
But this pain never goes away.
It dulled with time for which I am grateful.
I move on, tell stories, look at pictures and even laugh out loud remembering.
I've heard that time heals all wounds. If so, I'd like to know how long is time?
Is it yesterday or last week or 27 years.
I must have heard wrong.
I find no healing, no forgetting.
The sadness creeps up when I least expect it.
How do I explain half a smile and some tears over a box of oranges and apples?
Or a pensive look when I see some navy guy?
Or a beautiful black lab?
How do my sons know my sister?
She doesn't come up in conversation often, perhaps a story during the holidays, a note on her birthday.
It is sad.
She is lost; so am I.
05/17/2006
Notes and Reminders
On the earth’s edge I take notes in my mind:
Bushy tailed and tamed, squirrels solicit handouts of picnic pieces.
Sea otters skillfully dive delving for dinner from the deep,
As the babes learn from the elders and the moms tolerate their play.
Seagulls skim the surface of the morning ocean whose calm is already broken by divers daring the depths, lured by the sea’s secrets.
Children in all sorts of flavors chance the rocks like goats not gazelles
Stretching tall, out to harness the wind and the expanse
Or crouch low to capture glimpses of sea stars and hermit crabs.
They move on, playing toe tag with waves, skipping backwards,
Arms drawing stay away circles in the air.
The dark circles of wet on their pants legs tell who has won the game at least once.
Indulging children with the tantalizing temptations of the ocean, parents pause.
They sit, sanded, safely away from the foaming fingers of the waves,
Trying to remember when they themselves played such games
And wondering why they stopped.
04/04/1994