Poetry by Molly O'Dell

Molly O’Dell is a family physician and loves being outdoors, her primary influencer. She also loves writing and received an MFA from the University of Nebraska in 2009, published a chapbook, Off the Chart, and a multi-genre collection, Care is A Four Letter Verb, thanks to the regional and national literary journal editors who published her poems. She currently serves as poetry editor for the Journal of Medical Humanities.

The Silver Service

My older sister used to admire mom’s silver
service, took each piece off the salver to touch
scalloped edges, rolled handles and delicately
hinged pots. That service festooned our sideboard

in the small dining room where we grew up.
When mom died, sis was the only sib interested
in repetitively polishing the creamer, sugar bowl,
lidded coffee and tea pots, a waste bowl, plus

the heavy-footed serving tray. Once in her home,
the sterling shined more brightly because she relieved
every groove of darkness. Last week, when I visited
her I learned many things—

She no longer knows if her oven is gas or electric
doesn’t recognize pictures of our father, never
unloads the dishwasher or runs a load of laundry
and the silver service sits dulled black with tarnish.

Fourth of July Morning

Pea soup river fog blocks any view of the mountain
and deceives songbirds about the flush of morning.

Silence is notable on this day bound to end with thunderous
cracks and booms from the Carnival fireworks show.

Everyone I pass walking, waves. The half-mown lawn
has become three-quarter mown since yesterday.

The man on Boyd St. left a bag of empty aluminum cans
for me to drop in the yard of the lady who recycles.

One fellow, walking to his car, startles as I pass. He tells me
I scared him, he didn’t see me, he just woke up. “Happy 4th”

we say in unison. Climbing the hill, plump wineberries
beg picking, sweet and sour but much smaller this year.

Cold spring followed by dry June, the sticky berries glow
cherry red and still ripen in time for the 4th again this year.