IN MEMORY OF RADKA TONEFF Poem by Jan Erik Vold

Norwegian jazz vocalist, 1952-1982
It's autumn. Leaves are falling. A friend
drives her car

into the woods, she who was always with us
with her smile and her

thoughtfulness - yet she was
sans canoe? The ballad of the sad young men is not

the song of the birch, turning golden
when the wind gusts

hit. Or the frost
pulls out his wire cutter. What kind of garments

lie on the ground, where the birch tree
stood? Radka, we miss you. The sun shines

like a bedpost
above the spruce grove.