Читать книгу Light in Light - Deborah Gerrish - Страница 8

my mother and my father died in February. One that morning

one that evening, four days, one hundred four hours apart. Seasons

later I drive through the old neighborhood past my childhood

friend’s brick house with picket fence, our houses back to back.

Years ago I’d babysit his sister on weekend afternoons. Patiently wait

for him in his modern ’60s kitchen, as he clicked his bronze toy gun

between bites. A slow-moving, prolonged lunch, one bite at a time,

one click then another. Grilled cheese. Bite, click. With bacon, click,

click. Or peanut butter on toast, click, bite, click. Tried to convince

myself I held no grudge about his caterpillar style. His mother

brushed him along like an autumn fly, pushing swigs of Boscoe

milk to wash the meal down quickly. By mid-afternoon—

we’d take our places outdoors behind rough columns of trees,

play tag beneath the sky with its apricot glow, mortality weighing

on the leaf-spare branches. In the wide back yard, heaps

of maple leaves, stiff azalea and hundreds of acorns. Abandoned

Adirondack chairs, air enriched with pungent smoldering

leaves & wood burning fireplaces. Darting between the willows,

Eric shrieked, You Jane me Tarzan, and I chanted, Eeeee-Ah-Key.

Giggles & that unforgettable toothy grin from his young sister,

as she chased us in concentric circles between neighbor’s yards,

the October air turning crisp like white transparent apples,

the slanted sky against the day’s final hour. If only I could

speak to the trees and the shadows of actors.

If only my childhood contained me like the heavenly bodies

protected by stars. I wish I could say I didn’t see nightfall

coming or that I wasn’t so lost in a retinue of dreams.

I wish I could say I’m not shocked. But I stuff my pillows

with lavender flowers so I can sleep through winter.