NEVER ALONE

I was by myself a lot as a child,
lost in books and daydreams.
Eloise, Babar and Curious George
kept me company on long, rainy days,
under night time covers.

I found more friends when I stepped outside.
A line of black ants traversed
the crotch of a willow tree,
too busy to notice me. But the tree
sang, so I listened.

All the little forget-me-nots smiled at me
from the banks of the brook,
while an ancient trout
hid his rainbow in the weeds as I dipped
my toes in icy, tumbling water.

Once, I sat with a peaceful Guernsey,            
she on one side of the fence, I
on the other. I stroked her soft fawn ear
until it was time for both of us to go home.
In my dream, she told me, “There are no fences.”

Shaun R. Pankoski (she/her) is a poet most recently from Volcano, Hawaii. A retired county worker and two time breast cancer survivor, she has been an artist’s model, modern dancer, massage therapist and an honorably discharged Air Force veteran. A 2024 Pushcart Prize nominee, her poems have appeared here and in ONE ART, Quartet, SWIMM, and Jackdaw Review, among others. She was selected as a finalist by Lefty Blondie Press for her chapbook manuscript, Tipping the Maids in Chocolate: Observations of Japan, and as a first runner up for their Editors’ Choice Broadside Series for her poem, Lupine.