The grassy lawn, with her little uneven rises and tiny yellow wind-seeded flowers
beneath my feet, reminds my calves of being at an age of not knowing much more than to
look long at the small flowers growing everywhere over a wandering-way through an
everyday place more beautiful than the sidewalk.
The sun sliding in and out of leaf-swelled branches reminds my shoulders of being at an
age where I never thought to name the sway of my arms, the swing of my legs or the
barely audible music guiding my small body as I walked to the park.
I draw my being back into now, beneath century-old trees, my gaze hazing over these
traces of childhood memory. I close my eyes and listen to the longing songs of nearly-
dusk, the ones between birds and the ache accompanying the coming of darkness and the
quiet wait for morning I rarely don’t notice since my mom flew away.
I surrender my awareness to the remaining sunlight, the fresh summer leaves rustling
overhead dancing with an invisible breeze, and I am content… for the first time in days.
This contentment, this presence, it is not quite a habit but the obscuring film – protection
from hurt, a layer of worry, my eye on a different space in time when thus and so is some
better way (as adults so often do)… – yes, this film is lifting, leaving me free, and tender.
I didn’t mean to forget.
I didn’t mean to name everything.
I didn’t mean to hold on too tight.
I didn’t mean to sing less each day, to sigh more, to give away bits of wonder for shades
of grey flecked with plans of one-day-when.
Now here, beneath the gathering evening, alone on the uneven flower-gifted grass, I
remember again, there is a way back.