Do you remember that morning?
Do you remember the silk scarf of the breeze?
How it carried the remains of the fire?
I knelt in the chilled shade of the garden,
black soil memorizing the curve of my knees,
ashes tickling my cheeks
and burning the back of my mouth.
The pods felt like fleece in my hands,
so small when compared to the size of yours
as they cracked open a pod longer than my palm.
You explained to me how the peas,
perfect and small and round and nestled together
were just like you and I: two peas in a pod.
Do you remember how those same hands,
rougher than rope,
lifted me to sit of your shoulders?
They lifted me higher than the burnt ladders
in your shed ever could.
I clutched your shoulders,
just as burnt as your shed and shrieked.
My fingers twisted in your silk sand hair,
yours laced loosely around my skinny ankles.
You never carried me like that again,
you never again held my hands in yours,
you never came back home.
The shed's ashes danced on the wind
just as you danced out of my life.
Last memory of my uncle before he went off to who knows where.