The best part of lent
Are the Fridays when
We can't eat meat
Or before sunset
Because my mom and I drive to McDonald's and eat filet o fish while she smokes her misty ultra lights and I listen to her favourite classic rock station with the windows rolled down watching the wind chill work its way in from Lake Michigan to the trees on Chicago avenue
We talk politics and music and god and then our own lives which always seem so small after
I'll try to work the courage to ask her if she minds if I smoke too
And she will try to ask me how aa is going
"You have cheese on your cheek"
"Oh thanks, you just ashed on your pants"
"Oh thanks"
That'll be it
And that'll be nice
And we'll drive home under the wind chill and soft leaves growing again and soft moon gently shining like her watchful worried eyes
It's only forty days
But Jesus spent those forty with the devil
It's nice to get to know his wife