At the Cell Phone Lot by Robert Demaree

Part One: RDU

Because we have not done this before,
Are 81 years old,
Because it conforms to the way we do
Other things,
We arrive at the cell phone lot
An hour before her flight,
Our friend’s daughter, only child,
Coming to take her father,
Recently bereaved,
Back to Kansas,
To her family, his family,
His daughter, her wife,
Their son,
Only child of only child,
Trombonist in the marching band.
The week before we had mourned
A passing; poems were read,
Family photos on the mantle.

We watch planes land.
Cars come and go
In the cell phone lot,
The insolent competence
Of people who do this all the time,
And we eat our Subway sandwich
As in the days of
Our grandchildren’s concerts—
Handel’s Largo from Xerxes
Scored for high school band.
The phone rings,
Her plane is on the ground.
In grieving
You see the best of families.

Part Two: MHT

At the Manchester airport we wait for
Our daughter coming to help open up.
We realize this is more
Than a sweet gesture.
Heavy lifting in short
Spurts now.
I rest while she sweeps.
Early June in New Hampshire.
Various green light
Rich with possibility.
We are 81,
My parents’ age, I now recall,
The last time
They drove themselves north.



Robert Demaree is the author of four book-length collections of poems, including Other Ladders, published in June 2017 by Beech River Books. His poems received first place in competitions sponsored by the Poetry Society of New Hampshire and the Burlington Writers Club, and have appeared in over 150 periodicals. A retired educator, he resides in Wolfeboro, N.H. and Burlington, N.C.