Like this one—
fading family portrait,
sixties style,
Mother, Father, Sister,
Brother
in front of the fireplace.
Neil and Buzz had not yet
proved
to the world that gravity,
the ultimate bully,
was not so tough after all.
That’s me, of course,
crew cut, cow lick, shirt
tails tucked in,
a third grader’s leaning
eagerness
to please.
But that smile is cut out
and pasted
over a fact you’d never
see
if you didn’t know
where to look.
That day, portrait day,
I had spent every eternal
moment since dawn
tumbling down steep hills,
gravity’s newest plaything.
Freeze frame:
me pinned to my spinning bed,
the only thing left
between my small body
and the dark center of the
earth.
Next one:
cold porcelain hears my
confession
of mortality, done to
symbolic death
by viral marauders.
To see the point in
speaking of such things
on a scrubbed and bright
Mother’s Day,
like making a rude noise at
a proper
Ladies Luncheon,
then look closely, just here:
See, my mother’s arm
around my waist,
her hand placed gently
across
my smoldering stomach
to say “I am here, I am
here.”
It’s a detail in the snapshot
that is
easy to miss, unless you
know where to look.