Lesléa Newman’s poetry books include Still Life With Buddy; October Mourning: A Song for Matthew Shepard (novel-in-verse); I Carry My Mother, and I Wish My Father (forthcoming, January 2021). A past National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellow and former Northampton Poet Laureate, she lives in Hampden county. (Leslea is the person who had the idea for this project and served as a member of the editorial review board.)
I just want to give you a big hug and kiss!
Aunt Phyllis and I keeping six feet apart,
The distance between us a deadly abyss.
I just want to give you a big hug and kiss!
How long can we all go on living like this?
So near yet so far, with her hand on her heart,
I just want to give you a big hug and kiss!
Aunt Phyllis and I keeping six feet apart.