Only Now

                 —after Jim Moore

by Laura Ann Reed


But I’m not ready, my father says,
to be taken off the playing field—

and first I bring him shells that hold
the sea. Then river stones. Then I

bring his favorite recordings
of Paul Robeson singing spirituals

and lullabies. These make him cry.
And it’s only now, two decades

later, that I see my error: All he needed
was for me to be with him, to step

closer to his bedside. To allow into my heart
what flooded his—all that loneliness.


* * * * *

"Only Now" was first published in ONE ART: a journal of poetry and is part of Laura Ann Reed's chapbook Shadows Thrown (Sungold Editions, February 2023).

Laura Ann Reed, a San Francisco Bay Area native, taught modern dance and ballet at the
University of California, Berkeley before working as a leadership development trainer at the San
Francisco headquarters of the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Her work has
appeared in numerous journals and anthologies in the United States, Canada and Britain. She is
the author of the chapbook, Shadows Thrown (2023). Laura and her husband live in the Pacific
Northwest.