Nancy Scott
Keeping In Touch
I heard from my father.
If he were still alive, he'd be 95 in July.
He congratulated me on my new book,
poems about my childhood.
You've been unfair to your mother, Dad said.
She couldn't help herself, but I did love her.
You were always fighting, I said.
Such a long time ago, it's grown blurry, he replied.
*
It rained the entire afternoon.
I spent an hour detangling the philodendron.
I thought about Mother.
After she died, her voice circled endlessly
on my answering machine.
What are you cooking for dinner tonight?
Bio
Nancy Scott is managing editor of U.S.1 Worksheets, the journal of the U.S.1 Poets' Cooperative in New Jersey. She is also the author of nine collections of poetry. Her most recent, Ah Men (Aldrich Press, 2016) is a retrospective of the men who have influenced her life. She is also a collage artists and exhibits her artwork and her poetry together. www.nancyscott.net