Late Poems

Regarding judy’s late poems, they reflect the pain and difficulty of the last several years of her life. This includes her husband, Terry’s, increasing decline due to dementia through his sudden passing from Covid in the fall of 2020, followed by the shocking sudden death of her younger son, Evan, in February of 2021. It includes leaving her much-loved home of decades, Elysium, to move into an independent living apartment (that did not live up to her expectations). And finally, her own physical decline from several health issues—including an essential tremor that not only made painting impossible, but degraded to the point where she couldn’t read her own handwriting; a broken coccyx that left her in constant pain, later exacerbated by severe lymphedema. A very private person, she also suffered the indignities of being regularly assisted by aides (some of whom she became very close to), devolving to the point where she required someone with her 24/7. It was not the end she wished for, though she clearly wished it to end.