Across the din of the living...

I speak with you. When there were no words, I chose to write those of others. Miss you seems so trite. I do miss hours of coffee talk but mostly I simply miss you.

Yellow

Yellow is a bright six-legged bug
and the color of teeth after too much coffee.
Yellow is my disposition
and the sun upon tulips.
Yellow is the movie Old Yeller which made me cry
and the color of banana pudding.
Yellow is my favorite pullover sweater
and the gumball that rolled around and down the track.
Yellow is a croquet ball on a balmy Florida evening
and the color of our Volkswagon.
Yellow is the sunflowers she loved
and the color of the lemonade I made for her
memorial service.

She is your mirror, shining back at you with a world of possibilities. She is your witness, who sees you at your worst and best, and loves you anyway. She is your partner in crime, your midnight companion, someone who knows when you are smiling, even in the dark. She is your teacher, your defense attorney, your personal press agent, even your shrink. Some days, she's the reason you wish you were an only child.

Barbara Alpert

A Clear Midnight

This is thy hour O Soul, thy free flight into the wordless,
Away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson
done,
Thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the
themes thou lovest best,
Night, sleep, death and the stars.

Walt Whitman

It's all I have to bring today

It's all I have to bring today –
This, and my heart beside –
This, and my heart, and all the fields –
And all the meadows wide –
Be sure you count –
should I forget
Some one the sum could tell –
This, and my heart, and all the Bees
Which in the Clover dwell.

Emily Dickenson

"You can't think how I depend on you, and when you're not there the color goes out of my life."

-- Victoria Woolf, to her sister

Drops of Jupiter

Now that she’s back in the atmosphere
With drops of jupiter in her hair, hey, hey
She acts like summer and walks like rain
Reminds me that there’s time to change, hey, hey
Since the return from her stay on the moon
She listens like spring and she talks like june, hey, hey

Tell me did you sail across the sun
Did you make it to the milky way
to see the lights all faded
And that heaven is overrated
Tell me, did you fall for a shooting star
One without a permanent scar
And did you miss me while you were
looking at yourself out there

Now that she’s back from that soul vacation
Tracing her way through the constellation, hey, hey
She checks out mozart while she does tae-bo
Reminds me that there’s time to grow, hey, hey
Now that she’s back in the atmosphere
I’m afraid that she might think of me as plain ol’ jane
Told a story about a man who is too afraid to fly so he never did land

Tell me did the wind sweep you off your feet
Did you finally get the chance to dance along the light of day
And head back to the milky way
And tell me, did venus blow your mind
Was it everything you wanted to find
And did you miss me while you were
looking for yourself out there

Can you imagine no love, pride, deep-fried chicken
Your best friend always sticking up for you
even when I know you’re wrong
Can you imagine no first dance,
freeze dried romance five-hour phone conversation
The best soy latte that you ever had . . . and me

Tell me did the wind sweep you off your feet
Did you finally get the chance to dance along the light of day
And head back toward the milky way

Lyrics: Train

April Come She Will

April come she will
When streams are ripe and swelled with rain
May she will stay
Resting in my arms again
June she'll change her tune
In restless walks she'll prowl the night
July she will fly
And give no warning to her flight
August die she must
The autumn winds blow chilly and cold
September I remember
A love once new has now grown old

Simon & Garfunkel
lyrics

Now fades the last long streak of snow,
Now burgeons every maze of quick
About the flowering sqares, and thick
By ashen roots the violets blow.
~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Remember me when I am gone away

Remember me when I am gone away.
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand.
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me: you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had.
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than you should remember and be sad.
~ Christina Rossetti

"Perhaps they are not stars in the sky, but rather openings where our loved ones shine down to let us know they are happy."
~ Eskimo Legend

Star Gazer

One cold and solemn winter night,
I paused to view a wondrous star;
A brilliant, luminescent light,
That spoke of heaven from afar.

It hung against the ebon sky,
And as I turned to solitude;
It drew me nigh, with twinkle high,
Then chose to lift my attitude.

For as I stilled to view God's art,
The star at once began to play;
Then merrily, I saw it arc,
To race across the Milky Way.

Encircled by the atmosphere,
The star then paused to give a wink,
And vowed in time to reappear,
But then was gone within a blink.

I sighed, amazed by heaven's boon,
And caught a vision through the haze,
There peeking from behind the moon,
A twinkling light, my star's sweet gaze.

Sherry Pedersen-Thrasher



In one of the stars, I shall be living.
In one of them, I shall be laughing.
And so it will be as if all the stars were laughing when you look at the sky at night.
~ The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery

"God gave us memories that we might have roses in December."
~ Courage (1922) J.M. Barrie

Ah, Sunflower!

Ah! sunflower, weary of time,
Who countest the steps of the sun,
Seeking after that sweet golden clime
Where the traveller’s journey is done;
Where the youth pined away with desire,
And the pale virgin shrouded in snow,
Arise from their graves and aspire;
Where my sunflower wishes to go.

William Blake (1757-1827)

With Rue My Heart is Laden

With rue my heart is laden
For golden friends I had,
For many a rose-lipt maiden
And many a lightfoot lad.
By brooks too broad for leaping
The lightfoot boys are laid;
The rose-lipt girls are sleeping
In fields where roses fade.

A.E. Housman (1859-1936)

Jimmy

It snowed last year too: I made a snowman and my brother knocked it down and I knocked my brother down and then we had tea.
~Dylan Thomas

"I am sworn brother, sweet,
To grim necessity, and he and I
Will keep a league till death."
~William Shakespeare

"God has blessed me with many things in you, my only brother. "
Sherry Pedersen-Thrasher

How do I love thee?

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

--Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Sherry, Kimberly & Leigh Ann

"We are sisters. We will always be sisters. Our differences may never go away, but neither, for me, will our song."

Elizabeth Fishel

Roebuck 1974

Sherry age eleven in 5th grade and smiling. Leigh Ann would have been in fourth grade, Kim in second and Jimmy just starting school during this time.

Summer in Roebuck

Leigh Ann, Kim & Jimmy
behind our house in Roebuck, Alabama.