Demoting Mama

At five, my kids saw me as relevant.

As omnipotent, omniscient, clairvoyant

But since they got education

They’ve done a 180 rotation

And now they view me as irrelevant.

c 2013 by Katherine Harris Szerdy

Summer Synchronicity

It’s just begun today

Early spring’s promise

and I can wait patiently 

for the red blush of tomatoes

to dazzle the sun-bleached garden


as sunflowers stand sentinel




When the towering blooms stretch

higher than zucchini vines reach

along the garden fence.

In the corner the cherry tomatoes

remain true to their covenant to

pay us a visit each year

From hardy seeds resistant to

the chill of the Alberta clipper

and steel blades of the tiller

I can wait reverently, mindfully,

for warm rains to nurture

tangy succulence from the crimson fruit.

Nothing, oh nothing      

speaks summer like the fullness of

the harvest, unhurried, ready.

   

c 2013 by Katherine Harris Szerdy