Some people recoiled
when I told what I knew
my father would want:
His ashes scattered

of the time:
There were two kingdoms of living things,
animals and plants.
Fungi were classed as plants

When I was two years old
and never quiet, you said
you’d toss me in the Plymouth coupe
and take me for a ride.
Only seeing the Oregon countryside

I saunter down an unpaved road
among orchards,
just watching birds.

An elderly farmer rolls up,

Linda Bentley left her lover
in New Mexico.