Category: Poems Of Remembrance

In Loving Memory

My mother’s passing was in 2004. Life was not always easy for my parents, and yet when I think of them, I think of unconditional love. Poetry is memoir for me. This is a favorite poem. I no longer drive this route, yet memories are as vivid as yesterday. I took the photo this year.

through the Light
of Christmas
I found my way
home

from a hospital
and nursing home
through city and
small town
Main Streets

their streetlamps
with holiday lights

as my mother
was on her way
Home

the time we shared

and still share

Ellen Grace Olinger

Winter In October

WINTER IN OCTOBER
For Paul F. Brandt

Another death
a sudden death
this autumn of
winter in October.

Condolences pour in
your service strengthens
and your body is laid to rest
in beloved Wisconsin land.

Now the grief begins
and how else could it be?

Surely a few people
will remain with us
in our loving sorrow
like the golden leaves
left on the tree
outside my window
that will turn green again . . .

Ellen Grace Olinger

Time Of Singing, A Journal Of Christian Poetry
Volume 35  “Intermezzo”
Fall 2008

You may also wish to visit the site for the Paul Brandt School Forest.

pine_trees

The pine trees are courtesy of wpclipart.

Taking Turns

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taking turns
letting each other go
only to learn again
how love grows,
Mother

*

another year has passed
since my mother’s passing
I sit and quietly read
a book she would like too

in loving memory
Enola M. Borgh (1917 – 2004)

*

Poems and photos are by Ellen Grace Olinger.

“taking turns” was published in Bell’s Letters Poet (No. 115, January 2006).

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Thanksgiving

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Ellen Grace Olinger

November Wisconsin countryside
Bare trees elegant against the sky
Colors in the landscape muted now
October’s glory is gone
And love grows eternally

Ellen Grace Olinger
Published in SMILE
(Fall/Winter 2008 – 09)

SMILE, a large print poetry journal, was edited and published by Joyce M. Johnson for many years.

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