Issue Thirty-Two - Summer 2018

Wordless

By Susan Rae Sampson

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
we passed
would shut me up.

Then you were 82,
brain wounded by a stroke,
housebound and bored
so I loaded you in my Chrysler
and took you for a ride.
You pointed out the route you wanted
up the Umpqua River
where you’d once seen elk.

We came across a whole herd
grazing in a farmer’s field
complacent as cows
and I couldn’t think
of a thing to say.

Copyright Sampson 2018

Susan Rae Sampson has retired from the working world and writes poems and essays for the pleasure of it. She was the winner of the first chapbook contest from Wild Leek Press with her Book of Birds. Her essays about natural science and history have appeared in Awake in the World and the Archipelago Journal. Her lifestyle articles have appeared in the Wenatchee World newspaper and the Wenatchee Good Life magazine. Her poetry has appeared in the SHARK REEF and Floating Bridge literary journals.

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