The Last Candle

The dark afternoons continue, the Festival of Light notwithstanding, and I am caught up in the gloom of the season of dying. Yesterday, I lost one of my closest friends, Gina Larkin, a talented poet, whom I met in 1997, on the lawn at the Frost Place in Franconia, New Hampshire.

I often say that I made the Frost Place up out of whole cloth. I was in my early 40’s, practicing law in New Jersey and had recently returned to writing. Most of the people I knew were lawyers, not writers, but I decided there must be some place one could go for a week in the summer and learn to be a poet. Writing on my own could only get me so far. I found an ad for the Frost Place in a copy of Poet’s Market, a publication I learned about by browsing bookstores– a week of poetry workshops in New Hampshire. This was exactly what I was looking for.

Heading to New Hampshire that July, I was more than a little nervous– imposter syndrome, work pressures, etc., etc. Walking around Robert Frost’s farm added to the anxiety. But on my very first day I found myself sitting on the lawn next to Gina Larkin. She was there for the first time too. She was also from New Jersey, also a novice poet. You never know when you are going to make a friend for life.

Gina and I went back to the Frost Place for many years. We exchanged poems. We read each other’s manuscripts. We socialized back in New Jersey. Gina and her husband, John, and my husband, Paul, and I often dined out together. When Paul died, Gina and John were there for me 24/7.

Around that time, Gina founded a literary journal, the Edison Literary Review, publishing poets both known and unknown. The journal had an amazing 20-year run. December for her was not dark. It was her favorite time of year. She loved Christmas and decorated her otherwise cobalt blue decorated house with all manner of Christmas decorations. Each year Gina and John hosted a wonderful Christmas party complete with TV yule log. Since I don’t celebrate Christmas myself, this was my Christmas. With her death my light is diminished.

Gina’s death is my most recent winter loss. My husband died in late December and was buried on New Year’s Eve. A few years after that I lost my father, more recently, my mother. The yahrtzeits of all three fall within a two week period. And this week would have been my stepmother’s 94^th birthday. She died earlier this year, as did her cousin Claire.

Both Ruth and Claire arrived here with their families as young girls from Germany, Claire in 1935, Ruth, early in 1936. Claire’s parents ran a boarding house in Brooklyn for Jewish refugees during and after the war. She heard many terrible stories of things that happened. Ruth’s family settled on a dairy farm in Poughkeepsie. I read a poem at her funeral that is now up on the Ritualwell site about an incident in her life. Here’s the link to the poem. https://ritualwell.org/ritual/the-parting-gift/

Ruth gave the Haggadah mentioned in the poem to my daughter, a rabbi. I asked her to photograph it, and the photo appears below. Ruth’s sister, Hannah, who is mentioned in the poem, died of brain cancer more than 2o years ago.

It's hard not to dwell in darkness. There was a bomb scare at my synagogue today. A Molotov Cocktail was thrown at a neighboring synagogue a few months ago. It is dark as I write this. I do not understand why people do terrible, terrible things to each other. Life is short, and life is hard. That should be enough. Love should be enough, that once in a while we are lucky enough to have people in our lives to love. I can hardly wait for the solstice.

With thanks to all who came to the Zoom party yesterday. It was wonderful to see and hear you.