Resolution was published in November 2006. It is Fran's first book of poetry.
Fran's love of words is evidenced by the poems in this collection. Read with your heart and experience a greater appreciation of the subtle nuances of the English language.
"In 'Resolution', the poet echoes Wordsworth's understanding of poetry as the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings originating from emotions recollected in tranquility."
--Constance Baechler, Ph.D.
Judge of the 2005 Georgia Writer's Association Annual Members Contest, Poetry
Here is the award-winning title poem from Resolution. It is the story of
the death of Fran's mother, an event which resulted in a life-affirming
resolution. Other poems in this volume reveal a lifetime of
The night my mother died
I sang and read and prayed;
I knitted as I thought about my life
And saw the fraying strands that joined me with
that woman lying on the bed.
The night my mother died
I listened to her breathe,
Then set aside my knitting and my book;
I called my sister, moved my chair across the
room, up to my mother’s bed.
I took her hand in mine
And eased my other hand,
Light as I could, straight on her struggling
heart.
So frail—the fluttering of a dozen finches
brushed against my fingertips.
The night my mother died
I held her crumpled hand;
No stranger—that—to me. I recognized
Her fingers—gnarled, tight-jointed, twisted,
frozen in an agonized refrain.
I worked my fingers in.
Her fist was closed. So tight.
So barricaded, as her heart had been.
The clock above her bed struck one. The finches
shook. Her breath was hard to hear.
And when my mother died,
She took a final breath;
She held it, arched her back and groaned, and
then
She sang her final song, a long slow sigh that
lifted her, and she was gone.
The finches hadn’t heard.
For ninety years they’d beat
Their wings; for ninety seconds more they tried.
They fluttered, faltered, strove to fly, and
settled, finally, folding in their wings.
The night my mother died,
Her hand, so tight, so closed,
Opened, and I held a baby’s hand,
Soft and supple. Liver-spotted, but—somehow—new.
The gift my mother gave
To me the night she died
Was a deep, strong, heart-committed knowing
That I will never close my fist and wait for
Death to come and open it.
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