I've been away, Texas and crazy. What a delight and humbling to see this here. Thank you Michelle, Lynn, Milner, Rick and Shari.

Its just beautiful-

congrats Larry

Ditto ditto on congrats, Larry. This'll be wonderful to read every day on this run-up to Thanxgiving! Tom

Choice, larry.

Maggie

Hi Larry,
I adore the last line. In fact, the last four lines:

And we hold hands this one time
as I recall the cabinets were white
with large chrome knobs—

the year we noticed the scar on Albert’s chin.

And I am with Lynn on


All of it.

I may be the only one here that doubts the skiff and the salvage of the cross and the passing out of style. Somehow everything else fits for me and this coming together does not seem to. It is possibly  just me missing something. Is it? Maybe it is so much more editorial than the rest, the rest being brittle (in a good way) connections, so brittle and associative that we are able to get to understanding by this new route.

Yes, this is just excellent-- what a pleasure to return to this poem on the front page. Your style doesn't always make it easy for the reader but it rewards careful re-reading. I like the nervous lope of this, how your sentences are structured to be as striking as possible without unnecessarily undisorienting the reader. Oddly enough, this actually makes me look forward to Christmas, especially since decorations and holiday candy are now in stock at stores. Thanks!

Take care,

-O