Poetry By Suzanne S. Austin-Hill

Gerry Dincher CC




After My Father Died, Nine Years Later You Left Me

and I stared straight through the counselor.
The frozen silence was broken
   with an ice-pick of a statement, 
   “You seem to be at a loss with loss.  
   Any idea as to why this is the case?”

History and traditions had sequestered the answer 
   for some four decades.
   
Child of the Great Migration.
   protected from the ills of life at all costs.
Segregation, Jim Crow, lynchings,
   black-face minstrels,  restricted opportunities
   be sure to drink from the fountain marked, COLORED,
   can’t go to Weeki-Wachee, 
   death.

Don’t talk about ‘em.
The deceased just went away.
Children don’t go to funerals.
Given nothing with which to fill-in the blanks.

After my father died, nine years later you left me,
   a year later my mother died, 
   four years later my grandmother died, 
   four years later my brother died.
   
Coping with loss is a learned behavior.
School was wide open.






Where I Am?

I am surrounded by chaos, calamity, and calmlessness.
But
I am experiencing concordance, comfort, and calm.
I am where I live, not where I’m from.

I am surrounded by chaos, calamity, and calmlessness.
But 
I am experiencing concordance, comfort, and calm.
I am not where I live and not where I’m from.

I am visiting my daughter, son-in-law, and four grands.
I am drinking a cup of  French vanilla creamer with a splash of coffee.
I am listening, rather than talking, to her.
I am organizing the floor of a pantry.
I am creating works of art - neat piles in a bedroom.
I am making the bed in another bedroom.
I am washing, drying, and folding lots of laundry.
I am being loved by Apollo, a sweet, doe-eyed Black Lab.
I am writing this poem in response to two prompts!

I am still surrounded by chaos, calamity, and calmlessness.
Yet
I am blessed to be experiencing concordance, comfort, and calm.
Why?
I am where my heart is.

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Suzanne S. Austin-Hill lives in Ruskin, FL.  She writes in a home office in a house built on a former tomato farm.  Her poems have been recognized by the National Federation of State Poetry Societies and the Florida State Poets Association.  Literary credits include TELEPHONE, Silver Birch Press, The Zest of the Lemon, Persimmon Tree, Lifestyles AFTER 50, and the Sandhill Review.  Her book, Sixty-seven Pages from the Heart, is available at amazon.com.