I know you’re out there somewhere
Somewhere, somewhere
I know you’re out there somewhere
Somewhere you can hear my voice

I know I’ll find you somehow
Somehow, somehow
I know I’ll find you somehow
And somehow I’ll return again to you

—Justin Hayward (of the Moody Blues)

•••

Her mother gave her the name of her beloved
childhood doll—Susie—a name my best friend

Sue shortened to sound, well, less doll-like.
I’d never met Susie, the doll, and, to my surprise,

Sue hadn’t either. And to her surprise, after her
mother died, Sue found Susie tucked into a drawer

of Sue’s childhood dresser next to Sue’s childhood
bed in her mother’s house. Now, as Sue sorts

the lifetime of the woman who gave her life
as well as her favorite girl’s name, I have come

to help. I take each of her mother’s coats
from the closet near the front door, fold them

carefully and place them in a fresh box as the
Moody Blues waft from Sue’s phone, songs we

came to love sitting around a record player in
her parents’ guest room in their long-ago house

by the lake. We pause to look at her wedding china,
to touch her silverware, admire the photos

of Nell Buchanan Lester six months after she left
this place she called home. We hope she’s out there

somewhere with her people, who are Sue’s people,
too. And Susie’s, who, by all rights, is Sue’s older sister.

Both of them—plus me, the girl next door—
spent a sweet afternoon remembering the woman

who dearly loved her two Susies, who,
I have no doubt, is still holding them close

wherever she is now.

•••

for Susan Marie Lester
(Sue, Suz, Susie—by any name, the best best friend ever)