Mary was just getting up from the dinner table when Jon and I walked into the Holbrook Adult Home where she’s staying.
She was as delighted to see us as we were to see her.
We got right to business. I told her that I had 15 poems, some that she gave me last week, for her new book. We went over some of them that I had questions about. These were the ones where she made changes, scratched out words and replaced them in hand writing that I couldn’t read, or moved whole sentences with arrows.
I just wanted to makes sure I got it right.
She liked my suggestion to call the book This Time of Life. The words come from her poem Silence in Life that she wrote last September:
“we get stuck on past time memories and joys
and times we had. this makes us sad. So change direction
put some new lights on this stage of life. Do for others
that are lacking. Be happy that this gift is given. Listen and love this
time of life.”
Mary is very happy to be having another book published. I think she thought it wouldn’t happen. Her last book How To Dance was expensive to print. Once it was sold out it was too expensive to have more copies made.
But this time, our friend Abrah will design the book through the online service Create Space and we’ll be able to print up as many copies as we need when we need them.
I’ll send off all the matieral for the book to Abrah tomorrow. I told Mary we’d be back with the proofs of the book when we get them.
Jon and I have pubished three poetry books with Mary in the last ten years. We’re all so glad to be working on another one.
We told Mary we expected her to be at the Bedlam Farm Open House in October and she said she’d be all well by then. That she was working hard at healing. She already moves around incredibly well for an 88 year old woman who recently broke her hip.
Mary told us about the letters she received from people who wrote to her after Jon posted her address on his blog last week. She did tell me that there wasn’t much for her to do during the day, so the letters meant a lot to her.
If you’d like to send a letter to Mary you can write her c/o Holbrook Adult Home, 73 North Street, Granville, N.Y., 12832.
