I chose the yellowed white pearls your hands crafted,
gifted art,
entwined with my memory forever.
Now on the morning drive west
the pink gold sun
rises slowly behind me.
This gift speaks your goodbye to me.
Your death was from my art undone.
I am sorry.
There is more care than orders scripted or procedures done,
more than the fatigue of so much hurt.
I chose the yellowed white pearls
entwined in memory,
awakened to a daily becoming,
not fading
burning off the haze of dawn.
To have and to hold “will not last long”
-too messy too expectant they said
yet 41 promise years later,
we stand each whole and yet one.
Never really over,
the gospel of love embraced.
The time together traced in the lives of too many
but especially three
with days years or moments left to bloom.
I woke to rolling thunder, exploding heat
clouds exhausted in felled surrender
and at my feet the ground gave way
in one deep breath a thousand sighs
the miracle I know as summer rain.
Only so many heartbeats said a man-
trusting scarcity somehow to direct a life.
But daughters
hold treasured seeds of grandma’s eyes and DNA
inside their wombs not yet full
and they dance.
The memory soaked moment
unwanted
stains
glass windows of prayer
church is not a go to place
but a space
where you are off stage
being
the beauty of creation
celebrating
home
