Four Poems by Heidi Slettedahl

 

Paper Calendars

I cling to paper calendars

Note the birthdays of those I love

 

Forget to send them cards.

 

I trace the oddity of this year

For one year only

there is a week for every year of my life.

 

I’ve never used them up before.

 

And next year I’ll double back

Count one week twice

 

Each year adds more duplicity.

 

The way the calendars forces 1 and 31 to share a line

To keep the rows an even four,

Form more essential than clarity,

 

Contained duplicity the goal.

 

Untitled

Right back here again

In the icky in between

Booking flights to see the sights we do not want to see

Tubes, monitors, hospital beds

Diminished body

Diminished mind

My dad.

Final Clearance

Eventually someone will go through this place too

Deciding what to throw and what to keep
What deserves a second life
What does not

I won’t be there to direct the future
Explain the past
The gap will have to be just that
A gap

We think we’ll know and can prepare
We never can

A house is just a house
And stuff is stuff

And books (oh books!)

Remain unread

 

The Cycle

Trapped in a cycle of regret

My mother clings to slights

imagined or real

Decisions made she wants to reverse

Anxious over judgments offered

when her children were young and burdensome.

 

 

Heidi Slettedahl is an academic and a US-UK dual national who goes by a slightly different name professionally. She is hoping to live up to her potential now that she is over 50. She has been published in a variety of online literary journals.