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Handprints, a nose print,
on the frost-filled pane.
A ghost? Of Christmas
past? A loved-one there
looking in at hearth
ablaze and home sweet
home. Golden light on
tinseled tree. Bows in
red and green. Gifts of
winter mirth and love’s
soft-mittened hand in
savored memories.
© 2025 Jennifer Wagner
MTB: Tableau Poem
Mom and Dad harvested the green apples
and then took down the tangled trees—
the apricot trees, too,
as they were dying.
But the lilacs still bloomed prettily
across the fence line
in our backyard
May to June.
In summer, Dad made a target
behind the garage
for me to work on my softball aim.
He always said I had
a good arm after that.
At Christmas, Luke gave me
a lilac blossom candle
(even his name means light-giving),
and baseball’s Spring Training is soon to start
here in the desert.
All this to say, if tattoos
came in scents, I’d get some.
Green apple, lilac,
old leather softball glove.
Little gifts lingering long upon my skin—
bright sparks of memory,
lit candles, shining always,
even in my dark.
© 2025 Jennifer Wagner
Chelan, in Salish
it means “deep water.”
Innumerable pieces of our hearts
are folded there
into its blue waves.
They scallop toward us in dreams
reflecting the rugged green
of shoreline firs and pines,
little houses dotting the hillside,
boat slips bouncing near the shore.
The cabin cradled
in the hillside above it
echoes from the sound
of all we shared there,
our infant family
now grown large.
Memories, thick
as the blueberry pies
made from our fresh pick—
of our cooler filled
with sandwiches and apples,
our little open bow boat
filled with sunscreen
and laughter.
We lost sunglasses to Tsi-Laan—
t-shirts, frisbees, our hearts,
to the deep of it.
And those surrounding hills,
clothed in golden summer velvet
above the tree line,
get swallowed up in its crystal hue,
the way we always do—
the swell of memories
in a wake behind us,
floating on a dream.
For Melissa’s prompt at dVerse using the artwork of Alma Thomas. I used her Light Blue Nursery (1968) pictured above.