You might have seen them through the window,
a little girl pouting on the stool and her mother
behind her, deft fingers weaving the strands
together, chocolate hair in french braids and the
wrinkles in her blue gingham dress.
There is a beginning to everything.
Golden-hair boy, caramel colors glinting in the sun,
pieces that flopped over his eyes and plastered
themselves over his forehead when the wind blew
erratic. He wears t-shirts streaked with dirt and high-
water jeans half-rolled, half-bunched up to his knees.
She thought, I could love this boy.
They're in the field again, ankles itching under her
frilly socks and ants crawling over her shoes. He lets
one amble around on his finger while she studies him.
Holding it up to the light, all serious and squinting,
He whispers, "They are so small."
She remembers this field for a long time.
She points to his heart. This is where I live. He looks
at her skeptically, raises an eyebrow."Is it awfully
uncomfortable there?" She lets the silence grow while
the birds make conversation and smiles to herself when
she sees him listening too.
Sometimes it is cold, but then you remember me.
There are pieces of love scattered around this world.
I have been trying to find them, trying to arrange them
into a comprehensible hope. There's the field. There's the
beach. There's the little stream that carries us where we
need to go. There's you, in that one summer.
It's been so long, but I remember. I remember it perfectly.
She's making a daisy chain while he looks out over the
lake. Climb the tree for me. I want to see how high you
can go. Nearly breaking the branches with his weight, he
calls out, in the purest joy you've ever heard to this day.
"You should see this view!"
*I do.
My heart feels sort of beaten up now that I've written this.