LAST TIMES / KATHERINE EDGREN

Breaking track in the shelter of fragrant pines
is over for us. Our knees and hips protest.
Instead of storing skis and poles forever,
we donate them to a resale shop.
The last time had come and gone.

You always know the first time,
but rarely see the last one coming. Afterwards,
in the rearview mirror, you glimpse
the fork in the road, that eternal detour,
as you hear the clunk of the curtain’s fall.

Your parents pick you up and set you down so many times,
and being carried is like riding an elephant,
an enormous luxury. Eventually,
you grow big or heavy, too self-sufficient,
or want to go faster, and they stop.

So many last times: the last warm day, last snow,
last menstrual blood. Pre-pandemic,
the last time soaking in a hot tub filled with chatty women,
the last time I sang beside others,
the last feeling of safety.
The last time I saw my brother, now a stranger.
The last time I saw my mother. Her powdery pink skin,
thin bones visible beneath. The look of desperation
I wasn’t able to erase.
The last time I saw clearly, before eye surgery,
or slept without pain.

What would be different if I knew it was the last time
we’d wake together in the same bed?
Would I try to say something wise?
Say thank you? Apologize?

KATHERINE EDGREN / DEXTER, MI

One morning over scrambled eggs, her parents revealed that her beloved Sunday School teacher, Faith, and their minister, John, had run away together, forsaking the church, her husband, two teenagers, his wife, his seven children, taking her last child; their love-child. Her fork clanged as she lost her appetite along with her faith. His fate was to drive a Yellow Cab. The homeless at a downtown mission became his flock.