recollection

Memento Mori

Here is a version of what happened, mine, 

teased from the wiry vacant bird’s 

nest that once cradled a brace of fine blue 

eggs, hatched now, certainty and faith long

since flown, tufts of truth, a few jagged bits 

of thin shell all that remain leaving 

plenty of room for sparrows and wrens, 

busy squatters flitting in and out, 

relining with fragile gauzy fiction, 
sitting on a new brood at once strange 

and familiar; take Cherokee Hill for 

instance, the setting of which I’m certain,

less so about the curious

application here of Red as motif:

sudden code-red wail of sirens

mad dash to Red Bank Baptist Church

dozens of strobing red lights

accordioned red Beetle

touches of red repeated on scattered Bud cans

pools of dark blood spreading out 

a distinction that would have gone 

unnoticed that hot afternoon, my aunt 

flushed from the short furious drive, three 

shirtless barefoot children ferried to their 

first brutal brush with certainty, at least 

one, perhaps, trying to imagine 

the light touch of the white sheet drawn 

gently over his astonished cooling face.