My Son’s First Love
She brought me a small bouquet of flowers
in a rescued bottle filled with water,
one small white rose, a pink daisy, a touch of greens
and a spray of white buds almost opening—
they seemed so delicate.
I placed them in the kitchen.
The ceiling light cast a shadow of lace
from the buds on the counter,
as fleeting as the passing decades…
Now approaching 70,
still reliving her first love,
she knew I would understand.
Windshield
I eased my car to the shoulder of the highway.
Clouds frothed like freshly poured beer
as a blackening cloud formed above.
A vertical shaft of lightning pierced through.
Wind-whipped clouds spilled raindrops
coalescing into rivulets on my windshield.
Then, a transcendent blue sky opened.
A Trip to Vermont
On our way north through Vermont, I turned my attention to the countryside as my husband—focused on the highway—gripped the wheel. He kept up a mindfully minimal conversation with our son, who was determined to return to Island Pond.
Dead corn stalks, but still standing. Chunks of ice pushed to the edges of the riverbed. Dark gray river against light gray ice against white snow banks. A captive audience of trees, silent sentinels of winter’s arctic antics, willful ways. Old weathered houses tipping and toppled like wounded giants. Icy roads, blue-gray skies, trees stripped of their greenery. The occasional red barn and evenly spaced yellow road markers danced past the eye at the Northeast kingdom’s edge.
Deep in Vermont, making the hazardous run through horizontal sheets of snow. Buckled in, buttoned up, anxiety shooting out in flashes of strained conversation, as we apprehensively drove our son back to his chosen community, not knowing if he would return to us.
An Appendage No More
I’m no longer
an appendage, not
my parents’ child, not
my children’s parent, not
my husband’s wife…
I’m an individual
with distinct thoughts,
eager to develop them
in my own time.
Picking up a thread of memory,
tugging gently
to see how it will unwind.
Through writing
I have become my own child,
delighting in the unexpected
turn of my own mind.
