Stepping Stones

By Virginia Thayer

Though Stepping Stones describes several actual stepping stones, the book is largely about the transitions in life. The poems in this book cover life from an early adulthood to advanced age. The settings are in Minnesota; Washington, DC; Massachusetts; and Florida.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 2, 2017
• ISBN: 9781524565336

Virginia Thayer

After her retirement as a teacher and counselor, Virginia Thayer has been writing, drawing, and painting. Her three books of poetry are Across the Stone Wall, Choosing the Flowers, and Gloves and Other Lost Things. She has written two stories for children, The Journey of a Snail and Dad’s Folly. One of her plays, The Silent Also Speak, was given a full production at the Center for the Arts in Arlington, Massachusetts. In 2006, she gave up shoveling snow and moved to Orlando, Florida, to join other family members. She has three children, one granddaughter, and one great-grandson.

Book preview

Copyright © 2017 by Virginia Thayer.

Library of Congress Control Number:      2016919876

ISBN:            Hardcover            978-1-5245-6535-0

  Softcover              978-1-5245-6534-3

                       eBook                   978-1-5245-6533-6

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 05/19/2017

Xlibris

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740134

To Chelsea and Seth

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Mount Pleasant

On the home front

Meeting

Washington, D.C.

The orders came

Writing to an APO

Waiting

Resolve

Return

Using the delayed action

Elizabeth mastering the world

the third child

Earning power

An early view of the river

Disobedience

The Mighty Mississippi

My brother Jack

A year passes

Picture-perfect

The Women’s Service

Splitting Up

Approach to Thanksgiving after the rift

Reverie

the season unseen

Afloat

Conversations

London to Athens

Breakfast at Nauplion

Dinner in Vraurona

Athens to London

After Vacation

Coffee

Hoeing in New England

work

Seth

Picking up the pencil

simple tools

Aftermath

a summer day

the flood

Apart from the fray

Cheers!

About those eggs

The old rooms

A rite outworn

After the hospital

Moving out of my zone

Easter In Orlando

Using it all

Toward the end

After sunset

Gloria

B. K. Ellsworth

The Trickster

On my 90th birthday

Midnight on Melbourne Beach

forced to move

2016

Acknowledgments

I wish to thank the Duxbury, Massachusetts Poetry Group for their insightful comments and support—especially Dolores Stewart Riccio, Anita Ouellette and Lee Mendenhall. I also wish to thank Jane Austin and Margaret K. Thayer for reading the finished manuscript and providing their critiques. For help with getting it all on disc, I’m most grateful to Shirley E. Mayor for her expertise and patience.

Mount Pleasant

Amherst, Massachusetts

1942

It’s up the stepping stones to the garage

wherever you go      to the local market

the university      a vacation on Cape Cod

Returning      it’s down one level

to