Existence
Natalie Alsdorf

Backs to the ground, swaying.

Crimson and canary-striped

hammock, cradling us three.

Lilac’s ambrosial perfume

fills the warm night.

I am afraid to blink, waiting

for a sole star to divide the sky.

 

Why does the moon rest just above

the roof tonight, but not tomorrow?

The moon has its own routine.

It, like me, has places to be.

 

Dad tells us tales of his time in London.

One scene plays in my head like an echo

as if the memory were my own, or real.

My visits are infrequent and long.

And cut short every time.

An ethereal glade, my father and his friends

running from the ecotone through the rain to a bar,

the sound of folk songs like mist in the air,

asking for chips, and getting fries.

 

A trivial locale in London,

that may only exist in my mind.

But it’s London to me.

 

And now the celestial night

holds in its merciful grasp–

London,

and rain, and the hammock.

It holds the lilac bush past its uprooting.

It holds the waxing crescent moon

lingering forever above the church roof.

It holds the anticipation

of a wish and the warmth of summer.

 

It holds loneliness and the reminder

of how much we must mean

to be this small and to still be loved.

It holds the secrets of life and death,

and the story of time. And I get to see it

for a fraction of its existence,

for the entirety of mine.