Cammy Thomas

poetry

Cammy Thomas’s most recent book is Odysseus’ Daughter (Parkman Press, 2023), poems written in response to the Odyssey. Three previous poetry collections were published by Four Way Books. Cathedral of Wish received the Norma Farber First Book Award from the Poetry Society of America. Tremors received 2022 Poetry Honors from the Mass Book Awards. A fellowship from the Ragdale Foundation helped her complete Inscriptions. Poems have recently appeared in Naugatuck River Review, Hampden Sydney Review, Smartish Pace, and The Ilanot Review. She lives near Boston, where she teaches literature and creative writing to adults. For more information, please visit www.cammythomas.com/.

Lunch With My Aunt

Where was that restaurant she used to take me to, a tiny French place with steep stairs going up, somewhere in the East 80s, too expensive for me, an omelet and a white wine, surrounded by women with styled hair, heels, fancy shopping bags. I loved that place because I loved her. I couldn’t answer the questions she asked: How were my parents? Was I happy? It felt safe there, no men, no loud noises except laughing sometimes, and hearts of palm salad with lemony vinaigrette, me just learning to drink, and a comfortable buzz after, when she left for a meeting and I staggered around the Met looking for Greeks and Egyptians. I always visited the mummies, many on display back then when it didn’t feel wrong to stare— just an archaic warning. How imagine the world with her not in it? Her apartment looked out on 85th and Fifth. A glass dolphin on her windowsill made a prism on the opposite wall. Deep in winter the snow fell quietly on Central Park and on the gray roofs of the Museum.

“ When I was a child, my father’s sister was a guardian angel to our unstable family, and later we became great friends. Some years after she died, I was walking down Madison Avenue in Manhattan, and started to look for the restaurant where we sometimes went for lunch. I couldn’t find it, but a flood of memories of the place and of her led to the poem. I still miss her. ”

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