An ESME Poetry Award Submission by Loralie Kay
DINING FINE
Up here,
perched up high on asphalt shingles
overlooking oleanders
and our neighbor’s yapping dogs
Up here,
my three daughters made the dare
we all scrambled up the ladder
lugging with us bags still warm
Up here,
laughter fills our all-girl outing
as I pass around the Big Macs
and the swollen yellow fries
Up here,
there’s no empty dadless chair
at the dining table’s end
just because he drove away
Up here,
we create a new tradition
we start fresh, we’re still a family
nothing broken fills this space
Up here,
we’re above the old-time mem’ries
how we once looked as a family
a new beginning now emerging
Up here.
I’m a mom, a grandmother, a writer, and a poet. I’ve loved poetry ever since my dad sat me down and helped me write my first poem. He then signed me up for high school journalism where I became the editor of the school newspaper. Later I attended Brigham Young University on a journalism scholarship. My writing ambitions have sprung back into life. I’m an active in the High Desert Chapter of The California Writer’s Club, was a mentor for honor high school students working on the Dorothy C. Blakely Memoir Project, and have written an award-winning memoir, From Mormon to Mermaid. I find ideas for poetry popping up all around me and love breathing life into them. With several poems already published—my fun is just beginning.