Boasting coffins thick and cushiony as wombs,
Pay last respects; their waxen image so
Still, reprimands against motion – their tombs.
Pirouette darkly against the moon, on we go.*
Penny Leavitt, 2013

She walked and talked the boards – a gravelly
Voice chasing the arts among the vagaries of
Melody and meter and the colors of balloons.

Penelope Marguerite – seven syllables to sway
The boldest of characters in the most honored
Stories to be seen and heard on stage.

The little Shorewood house – known to groups,
Nay herds of neighborhood critters and their
Off-spring – where Penny dwells.

“I hear the pulse of you,” she wrote, “solemn-
Sweet pipes of the *****” – and abruptly shook
Herself up and got on with it.

That unmistakable pony-tail in strands of gray
Marched with precision through grocery aisles –
Cat food in cart and lottery ticket in hand.

In the class notebook, she penned with care
The tales of a teenaged temptress, “sauntering
Sexily, swinging svelte lissome *****.”

Co-poets often thought her lost – she travelling
Unannounced to Montreal or Chicago – but
She bore the title of grandmother proudly.

Penny gave her heart to whoever needed it –
Not that she lost it – as snippets of amazement
And humility took their places elsewhere.

“This is what grandmas hope for," she wished
For the face of nature to reveal its magical
qualities to her grandson.

Age and its surprises were not immune to
Penny’s pen; she was an uncanny student of
The human story.

“We pass those who have gone before us;”
She wrote. “We become the lassoed souls
Of a younger, more agile dream.”

Pope said to act well our parts; there all the
Honour lies – Penny did so, and then some –
“We hold our faltering shadows high.”

There once was a poet named Benny,
Who could write a limerick like any.
It might have a word,
Unique or absurd,
But could not match those of our Penny!



© Lewis Bosworth, April 2017