The awards have been given at this year’s Florida Christian Writers Conference, and two have my name on them.
First Place in Picture Books – My Red Boots Rock!
First Place in Poetry – Forgetting
Look for My Red Boots Rock in 2023. But now, as a special gift to you, my faithful A Thought From Penny reader, I’d like to share Forgetting as a gift of understanding comfort to anyone living, as Nancy Reagan so aptly said, with “the long goodbye” of dementia. From my heart to yours:
Forgetting
Where is it?
It’s always been in the drawer by the Keurig
You never put anything back where it goes.
I don’t know.
You let her out the last time I looked
I’ll give her a whistle and see if she comes.
Don’t worry.
I know we parked the car down this row
It’s gray with that funny looking fin on top.
I lost you.
We said we’d meet by the birthday cards
Why are you here by the squash and zucchini?
Yes you do.
You know this road, we’ve been here before
It’s by the bank with the ATM for cash.
You know them.
They’re the couple who bought your mom’s place
We sold the house a year after she passed on.
Please don’t cry.
It’s okay—no need to recall that
I can remember enough for both of us.
You won’t forget:
“For God so loved the world,
that He gave His only begotten son,
that whosoever believeth in Him
should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16.
If you do.
If you don’t remember who I am
I’ll remember and be your forever friend.
© Penny L. Hunt 2022
