World Poetry Day

Monkey has gone. She is on the plane as I type. We played M-is-going-to-Japan-and-had-to-remove-from-her-suitcase-to-meet-the weight-limit-and-customs-restrictions alphabet game in the car on the drive down. That kept us amused for a while. We parked in the extortionate short stay and had lunch in Costa. Then she checked her luggage in and we went upstairs to departures. She walked through security and disappeared behind an opaque glass wall without even turning around to wave goodbye. I can see that Tish and I are going to use the lets-do-such-and-such-M-is-having-a-fab-time-in-Japan excuse a lot over the next few months. So she better have a fab time or we are going to feel guilty.

The radio reminded me that it is World Poetry Day so I give you Corinthians 13:11 by Jennifer Martelli that came to my inbox via poem-a-day from poets.org

I follow Marcia Brady on Twitter: Mo McCormick, Actor/Author.
She posts a video with her older brother and they dance, a fast waltz,
under an oak tree with dozens of hanging pastel paper parasols.
She holds his hands, looks up into his face: he watches her feet.
I wish we were friends. I'd call her, Mo, too, one syllable, low:
prayerful, bovine. Mo asks her brother, do you have a girlfriend yet?
She leads, spins him around: I love her in a way I couldn't back then.
As a child, I loved the middle girl, Jan, the jealous one, Eve Plumb,
Bible spondee fruit, with a TV J-name, and that blue crochet vest.
When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child.
When I was a child, I'd see Mo's face on my tin lunchbox, but now I see
her freckles mirrored a small star cluster visible on clear nights - 
Constellation of Bejewelled Silver Studs on Soft Velvet Bell Bottoms.
Constellation of Kindness. Constellation of Purple Devotion.

Stay safe. Be kind. Miss your daughter.