What is this need we have
to mark time?
Another November day…
rain and leaves fall,
And somewhere it is the
anniversary of a battle,
Or the memorial day
for an earthquake or flood,
Or the date a great jazz
singer-songwriter died,
And it is also the date
of my birth.
That early 70s evening,
my grandparents dined out,
Celebrating their once-upon-a-time
wedding, while my mother
Waited, not knowing it would be
her night to push and groan
Late into the evening to grant
her first child life.
Thirty-five years later,
the wedding date passes…
Orlo is dead many years and
Alta remembers nothing
Of the little girl with curly hair
eating gingerbread cookies
In her after-school kitchen –
both of us cheated of our past.
On my November day,
the temperature drops,
Puddles collect by curb and median,
mother winter waits her turn.
Still… lights and street lamps glow,
and trees twinkle with water,
Telling me:
to be alive is magic. Just that.