Just a Momentary Glimpse....back

Just a momentary glimpse back .....

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He grinned at me

over some "off the cuff" link 

I had just made with him,

a connection long sought

a verbal spar,

parried

as he stood poised 

between a child and teen.

Not an easy reach 

for a farther, a father.

Hair hanging lanky, 

in his blue green eyes,

lips spread like no end.

He grinned at my remark,

not remarkable by his standards,

but funny enough

to crack that mask of adolescence,

long enough to let me see

my little boy again.

Orphan of Ashes, A glimpse back at Mom.

Her Mu-Mu hangs in the closet 
like a really loud shower curtain
and sometimes it calls me to sniff it,
recapturing the scent of her.

It carries a faint trace of her perfume,
in the huge flowered prints it bears.
A pair of white canvas loafers sits below it,
right where she stepped out of them
and into enternity.

A couple of paperbacks with weak spines,
lie open on the page she paused at.

One might almost expect her to waltz in 
and shimmy into this garish garment,
slip on her loafers 
and just pick up on chapter four.

But she's tucked neatly in an urn,
on a coffee table at my sisters,

Now she's surrounded by silk flowers
much like the ones on this Mu-Mu.

I can't bring myself to 
throw this stuff away,
it's all that I have left of Mom.

A couple of K-mart leftovers, 
some gothic horror novels,
and the ashes of a love that was
beyond all expectations.

So I close the door on this moment in time,
framed like a still life painting 
minus the centerpiece,
in the back hall of my humbled abode.