My regular readers (both of them) may recall I am recovering from knee replacement surgery. My condition continues to improve. I walked around our block – about a quarter mile – both yesterday and today, and tomorrow I start outpatient physical therapy. It’s been three weeks since my surgery and I suspect in another three weeks I’ll be glad I went through with it. It’s a hard slog, but so is life on a worn-out, washed-up knee.

The weather has been chilly. We had a frost warning early this morning (May 18) and tonight’s low temperature may dip below 40 degrees, so I am posting a poem about another time the weather was unseasonably cold in Michigan. This is a rare poem written during my 40’s; most of my poems were written in my mid-30’s or beginning again in my 60’s. I wrote this poem on a day in June when I needed a winter jacket and really did see coyotes on the beach.

OCCASIONALY IN JUNE
(Northern Lake Michigan)

Rising to grey skies 
with winds born on the plains
blowing across the Big Lake,
it's hard to credit June today.

Coyotes stroll the beach as if
nearby homes were abandoned,
and only barely-budded leaves 
belie the certainty of snow.
 
But I have no one to please
and nowhere to go,
so today I have no objection 
to a wintry morning in June.

No objection at all.

And until next week . . .

The world always looks better 
through the bottom of a root beer float.

Cheers!

Subscribe to be notified of new posts by email; it’s free.
Leave a comment so I know you were here,
and please share this blog with a friend.

(Email may be delivered to a spam or social media folder.)

 A New Poem Every Monday
(tho’ sometimes life gets in the way)

Joseph Neely, all rights to original material reserved.