Imagined Instructions to a Remaining Mate

Betsy Joseph

May 4, 2025

Next to the tattered dictionary angled on the bookcase shelf,

place the iridescent conch shell we collected on the Cape

the day the storm blew in and the sea waters roiled,

the day we associated cancer with the crabs scurrying on the beach

and not with the mass attached to my lung.

Alongside the sidewalk etched with deep cracks,

the very one our daughters designed with hopscotch lines

and skipped their way through childhood,

stroll in the magical softness of sunrise,

in the quiet of dawn with our neighbor’s Burmese cat

(being sure to wear your wool tweed cap to ward off the chill).

When I am gone and when you feel ready,

on an evening clear with moon and stars,

take from the shelf our favorite, Bailey’s Irish cream,

and toast the golden orb that lit our nighttime chats.

Lastly, my love, meditate on remembrance rather than loss.

Betsy Joseph lives in Dallas and has poems which have appeared in a number of journals and anthologies. She is the author of two poetry books published by Lamar University Literary Press: Only So Many Autumns (2019) and Relatively Speaking (2022), a collaborative collection with her brother, poet Chip Dameron. In addition, she and her husband, photographer Bruce Jordan, have produced two books, Benches and Lighthouses, which pair her haiku with his black and white photography.