October 2020
Bio Note: I am a longtime editor, slowly publishing poet, and author of six picture books, including
From Apple Trees to Cider, Please! and The Boy Who Said Nonsense (Albert Whitman & Company). In 2018
I moved away from the masthead of an academic quarterly to work with people who want to share their stories, ideas,
and poems in print. It’s been a joy—and quite an adventure.
What We Hold Dear
I always park beside the Foran family
atop the hill. A giant maple spoils
my view, but I don’t care. It’s peaceful here.
Slowly, all at once, the world we knew
is being erased. Is this “good” or “bad”?
I have to take it case by case. I often
think these strange gray stones look like they’ve sprung
straight from the ground. They also look like teeth
in an old mouth, decaying, loose, and crooked
due to clime. Holding dear to time,
I sit and watch a herd of doe conduct
five spotted fawn across this August lawn.
A fear-free saunter, for there’s no one here.
It’s too damn hot. But I don’t care. I am
surrounded by the largest crowd in town
and no one says a word. I can think!
The silence bakes, and nothing seems absurd.
Indebted
Yes I admit to trolling Buy Sell Trade.
I’ve turned in gold for cash, counting paydays.
For some, sometimes, there’s never quite enough
to go around—for feeling safe and sound.
My mother stockpiled money for her funeral
in an old valise she hid beneath her bed.
Dollars raised, the secret selling off—
her treasured stamps, coins from Dad’s collection—
the store discovered during her last move.
Let’s put that suitcase in the trunk. Mom leapt
clutched it to her breast, as if a newborn.
What the hell? I cried. All was revealed,
this remnant of an Old World way of thinking.
Safer here than in some bloodless bank!
My grandfather was known to move then lose
a mattress-floorboard stash from time to time.
He’d accuse, lament the loss, until
Grandma, livid, came to him in dreams.
Sal, you stupid SOB! The money’s
safe behind that corner fireplace brick...
An angry ghost to thank for thousands saved.
In death and debt we learn what does the trick.
©2020 Felicia Sanzari Chernesky
Editor's Note: If this poem(s) moves you please consider writing to the
author (email address above) to tell him or her. You might say what it is about the poem that moves you. Writing to the author is the beginning of community at Verse Virtual.
It is very important. -FF