 For me, spring is a season of ghosts. My brother Andrew’s birthday is April 10th. He died of cancer at age 38. My sister Angelica’s birthday is May 9th. She died of cancer at age 54. My brother Brian’s birthday is June 7th. He died of cancer at age 55. I suppose I should go back and begin the list with my mother, who was born on March 22nd, but she died of heart failure at age 85, and although I miss her, the pain of my siblings’ deaths is more mysterious and pervasive, coloring every moment of my own life. I explored this endurance of grief in a poem I wrote two years ago, called “Snow and Oranges.” It was published in the Spring/Summer 2019 issue of Frost Meadow Review. Snow and Oranges by Laura Bonazzoli We go on. We talk of weather and the price of oranges the shops closing for winter the long nights of December. We go to work to a concert. On the road home we stop and watch the moonlight climb the snow. We remember or can’t forget that we are tasting oranges you must have tasted once or walking a crystal-jeweled hill you must once have walked. Either way we go on for moments for decades chasing you chasing you. The moon on snow tonight for instance is not bright enough to keep you from our eyes nor the scent of these oranges sweet enough to carry the earth of you away.
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