Months To Years https://monthstoyears.org/ Mon, 14 Apr 2025 23:56:59 +0000 tr hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7.2 The After Death Secrets https://monthstoyears.org/the-after-death-secrets/ https://monthstoyears.org/the-after-death-secrets/#respond Mon, 14 Apr 2025 23:56:59 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10202 “Someone loves you!” My mom read this text message on my dad’s phone number. My dad’s phone number. It’s strange to say it, as it was now my mom’s phone number after my dad had died five months prior. My mom received this message on Valentine’s Day. She told me about the message a few […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/the-after-death-secrets/feed/ 0 Bridge https://monthstoyears.org/bridge/ https://monthstoyears.org/bridge/#respond Mon, 14 Apr 2025 23:48:26 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10196 The post Bridge appeared first on Months To Years.

]]> https://monthstoyears.org/bridge/feed/ 0 Is This Your First? https://monthstoyears.org/is-this-your-first/ https://monthstoyears.org/is-this-your-first/#respond Mon, 14 Apr 2025 23:38:47 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10192 A simple choice between the disloyal Yes or the honest No that stabs like an ice pick as you brace for, How many do you have? Option A: The ice in your chest hardens to a blue block with jagged edges that slice your throat as faux-faulty math subtracts the stars that burned out too […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/is-this-your-first/feed/ 0 Paper Plates https://monthstoyears.org/paper-plates/ https://monthstoyears.org/paper-plates/#respond Mon, 14 Apr 2025 23:31:10 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10188 Jealousy is normal, particularly within close-knit families. New houses, well paid jobs, new babies and proposals. Siblings, cousins, second cousins, aunts, great uncles, many living lives I should want, but I don’t want any of the deep, meaningful stuff. I just want what they have on their paper plates. I don’t know paper plates, but […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/paper-plates/feed/ 0 In Lieu of Flowers https://monthstoyears.org/in-lieu-of-flowers/ https://monthstoyears.org/in-lieu-of-flowers/#respond Tue, 08 Apr 2025 23:18:06 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10180 Do give me space. Support don’t suffocate. I love you but you are standing too close to my face. Don’t compare losses. I am very sorry that your cat died but please shut up about it right now. Also, your grandmother was one hundred and two years old. Where I come from, that is a […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/in-lieu-of-flowers/feed/ 0 Non-Euclidean Departure https://monthstoyears.org/non-euclidean-departure/ https://monthstoyears.org/non-euclidean-departure/#respond Tue, 08 Apr 2025 23:11:44 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10176 When the ambulance caressed you here to effigy recumbent under the crisp white sheet in a clean cold gown far from your lair’s comfortable grime and warm clutter, I was not surprised to find the two of you so tight. Janine you clutch Karla, as you christened your pelvic mass—the name you reserved in your […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/non-euclidean-departure/feed/ 0 The Atomic Baby https://monthstoyears.org/the-atomic-baby/ https://monthstoyears.org/the-atomic-baby/#respond Tue, 08 Apr 2025 23:06:21 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10172 Nobody seems to worry about The Bomb, anymore. It was the guiding light of my childhood, but today it is seldom in the news, conversations, or even apocalyptic sermons. Few persons under sixty have heard of a fallout shelter. “Fallout” is a video game, isn’t it? In 1952 Dad bought cinder blocks, mixed mortar, and […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/the-atomic-baby/feed/ 0 Bumps in the Road https://monthstoyears.org/bumps-in-the-road/ https://monthstoyears.org/bumps-in-the-road/#respond Tue, 08 Apr 2025 22:58:58 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10168 Three bumps, none large, succession of each tosses you the way a kid hurls a rock over a bridge. Holding on for life you, neck broken, body paralyzed, I leap like a flying squirrel limb to limb tracing your path. You relearn basic skills— swallow, eat, speak, use a grip like fingers, navigate tight corners […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/bumps-in-the-road/feed/ 0 The Sad Woman of Seville https://monthstoyears.org/the-sad-woman-of-seville/ https://monthstoyears.org/the-sad-woman-of-seville/#respond Tue, 08 Apr 2025 22:53:24 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10162 The post The Sad Woman of Seville appeared first on Months To Years.

]]> https://monthstoyears.org/the-sad-woman-of-seville/feed/ 0 Thinning the Herd https://monthstoyears.org/thinning-the-herd/ https://monthstoyears.org/thinning-the-herd/#respond Tue, 08 Apr 2025 22:46:04 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10156 My husband and I need to tell my parents about my metastatic breast cancer diagnosis without our children hearing, so we decide to walk in our neighborhood. Our path is muddy, strewn with leaves. We’re not paying attention when we cross into a chained-off area, posted with AREA CLOSED TO ALL VISITORS signs. Just hours […]

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]]> https://monthstoyears.org/thinning-the-herd/feed/ 0 The Forest https://monthstoyears.org/the-forest/ Mon, 27 Jan 2025 17:25:47 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10037 Even after sharing what could be good news, the doctor still clarifies. “Your husband is not out of the woods yet,” he says. “He is in the woods. Deep, deep in the woods. All he can see are the trees.” I look at you then, lying in your hospital bed, sheets like snow—crisp, clean, cold. […]

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]]> The Corpus Callosum is Unremarkable https://monthstoyears.org/the-corpus-callosum-is-unremarkable/ Mon, 27 Jan 2025 17:18:00 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10033     —An In-titled Poem1 …or, rather, there are no lesions there, unlike in other, special areas (a.k.a., the temporal or parietal lobes), so this particular note isn’t meant to be an insult… Still, the MRI result’s essential premise misses the entire point about his brain: thus, it’s not a small slap to his persona, nor to […]

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]]> thief https://monthstoyears.org/thief/ Mon, 27 Jan 2025 17:06:52 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10028 I won’t write of       aberrant blood       cellls multiiplying       squeeziing iinto       allavaiiillabllespace             only of upstairs echoes numb place beside me in the dark in the waiting empty seat a table setting unset upright recliner by mine the dog still lying beside the front door

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]]> Goldfish https://monthstoyears.org/goldfish/ Mon, 27 Jan 2025 16:57:16 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10024 I pack extra silver linings like snacks for hungry toddlers who did not, could not know at the feast of my prognosis there would be no finger food.

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]]> It’s What You Do https://monthstoyears.org/its-what-you-do/ Mon, 27 Jan 2025 16:33:03 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10020 On Monday morning, exactly one week after my father died, Ruth knocked on our door. Though uninvited and unexpected, she was confident of her welcome. Ruth was my best friend’s mother. Mom invited her in. It’s what you do. Typically, Mom would offer a visitor coffee, or, had it been later in the day, a […]

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]]> When the Ascent is Over https://monthstoyears.org/when-the-ascent-is-over/ Mon, 03 Feb 2025 20:58:18 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10065 The rib cage can function as a ladder in the tradition of Chinese medicine. Each intercostal space the foothold for the soul to rise up on its journey of progression to leaving the body when the work of the climb is complete, when the ascent is over. I think about this silently as I examine […]

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]]> Sarajevo https://monthstoyears.org/sarajevo/ Mon, 03 Feb 2025 20:45:32 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10060 The post Sarajevo appeared first on Months To Years.

]]> In the Child’s Pose https://monthstoyears.org/in-the-childs-pose/ Mon, 03 Feb 2025 19:51:55 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10045 I’m curled on the floor of my bedroom in my parents’ house in Petaling Jaya. There’s a strip of floor between the bed and my mother’s antique Chinese cupboard—just enough space to open the cupboard door. Just enough for me to curl up on the parquet floor. The pillows are on the floor, along with […]

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]]> Light at the Threshold https://monthstoyears.org/light-at-the-threshold/ Mon, 03 Feb 2025 20:32:32 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10056 I understand now why you were glowing your smile a beacon on the threshold of death. A light held up in the silence of words you could no longer speak. No cancer or lingering concern could darken your soft expression. All the lines had gone from your face. All I could do was to sit […]

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]]> Peonies https://monthstoyears.org/peonies/ Mon, 03 Feb 2025 20:02:46 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10049 The post Peonies appeared first on Months To Years.

]]> Guilty Verdict https://monthstoyears.org/guilty-verdict/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 21:57:17 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10100 In April 2020, nursing homes, hospitals, and funeral homes in the county where I was coroner were struggling: what to do with the bodies of COVID-19 victims? I was in panic mode myself: my county had refused for decades to provide the coroner’s office with a morgue, settling for the odd free space in local […]

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]]> Sorrow Through Facebook https://monthstoyears.org/sorrow-through-facebook/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 21:47:45 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10096 Clemmie died last year in a car accident, only thirty-five years old. When I read about her death, it made me sad. When I saw how she was remembered, I was also angry. She had been a student of mine, during the Obama days, glory days for a long-time liberal like me. I was her […]

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]]> The Color in Pain (Series) https://monthstoyears.org/the-color-in-pain-series/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 21:24:16 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10087 The post The Color in Pain (Series) appeared first on Months To Years.

]]> Two Funerals This Week https://monthstoyears.org/two-funerals-this-week/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 21:35:49 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10092 On my way to a third, I come across a corpse on the road.                     Give rest, O Christ Eyes wide, tongue hanging, guts sprawled like a purse upended.                     to thy servant with thy saints I lift the dead from the gravel                     where sorrow and pain are no more place her on the verge, apologize for […]

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]]> Doctor’s Orders https://monthstoyears.org/doctors-orders/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 21:16:44 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10083 For this doctor’s appointment you put on a suit. You were ready for the good news. It had to be. After all, Dr. Smith told us that you would beat it. You sat there in the chair like a school boy so eager to receive that passing grade. Buoyant, as if the small examination room […]

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]]> There Is No ‘After Cancer’ https://monthstoyears.org/there-is-no-after-cancer/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 20:57:45 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10079 There’s life before…and now. And they are very different indeed. I arrive at 8:10 for my 8:30am appointment. I finally look up at the familiar glass entrance, after walking in a confused circle for more than a block, despite having been at this very place more than once before. I am distracted enough that I […]

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]]> Taking a Stand https://monthstoyears.org/taking-a-stand/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 20:24:15 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10071 It’s my first time riding a Baltimore city bus. At the fifth stop on York Road an elderly man deposits his fare. I notice his zipper is down. My eyes widen. I’m not comfortable with cities or buses or dirty old men. As he shuffles closer, I realize there’s a catheter running out of his […]

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]]> Rule of Thumb https://monthstoyears.org/rule-of-thumb/ Mon, 10 Feb 2025 20:34:29 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=10075 We thought we might lose her after a bad night and a switch to liquid morphine but she bounces back and wants a sandwich— no, not a sandwich, she says. She agrees to Rice Krispies but won’t open her mouth when I offer the spoon. Not Rice Krispies. What is it I want? Soup no, […]

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]]> There’s No Place https://monthstoyears.org/theres-no-place/ Wed, 18 Sep 2024 21:31:34 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=9872 Mom and Dad’s house, a two-story white farmhouse with a wide front porch, sat on four and a half acres with some trees, a couple barns, and a garage. It was built by my great-great-grandfather, the one whose name is in the front of the box of antique books I just went through. This place […]

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]]> Bath https://monthstoyears.org/bath/ Wed, 18 Sep 2024 21:18:50 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=9868          Be careful; wring it tightly in the tub and lather. Face the back, those ribs and spine, like beams that fail to taut a flaccid hide. And hold the hand when senile tears combine with ancient folds I crimped in stormy youth as gurgling creeks impressed upon that veil. But now, I care for you. […]

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]]> Eating Anything You Want Until You’re a Hundred https://monthstoyears.org/eating-anything-you-want-until-youre-a-hundred/ Wed, 18 Sep 2024 21:09:54 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=9864 Even though she was in her nineties, I thought my mother should give up eating frozen cream puffs and chocolate éclairs. But she seldom took my advice. At barely ninety-six pounds and with a relatively strong body, she took the advice of a doctor who said at her age she could eat anything she wanted. […]

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]]> The Hand Whisper https://monthstoyears.org/the-hand-whisper/ Wed, 18 Sep 2024 20:54:18 +0000 https://monthstoyears.org/?p=9860 dawn is worse the years pass one by two on my side I wait for its return a hand whisper as her breath haunts my nape’s chilled hairs my heart remembers that curved arm kiss warming up sleeping skin the way she made air move how it crossed over like a glider finding home I […]

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