The Andrew Poems

On a soft summer Virginia evening Shelly Wagner was pushing her five-year-old son in a tire swing in the backyard, idling away the hours between dinner and bedtime. She left him only for a moment, but when she returned Andrew had disappeared. He was found later that night, drowned in the river behind their home. From the depths of grief that followed, Wagner began to write poems—not as therapy, she says, but to see if she could express the range of her experience more fully than the published books she’d read. What emerged from Wagner’s quest is a volume of verse that has comforted and inspired thousands of parents, patients, and other determined survivors.These clear, unflinching poems wherein she evokes the life and death of her five-year-old son are moving and unforgettable. . . . You will remember Andrew as if you had known him, this delightful boy. —RUTH STONETreasureFollow my hand into this trunk.Examine for yourself its treasure.Lift and read the heavy wooden board,a scrap of lumberon which he scrawled his name—red letters, all capitals,the E backwards.In kindergarten he learnedto sign perfectly his many drawings,the jewels of his last will and testament.Try on his brilliant yellow sunglasses.See the world as he saw it—clearlyfull of hope.Slide your hand up the sleeveof his favorite red shirtas though you were to tickle him.He would laugh. You may cry.Finally, with utmost care,hold what he made in nursery school—a white plaster cast of his hand,fingers spread wide apartas though he were telling youhow old he would be when he died.