Remembering

 

There should be nothing here I don't remember.*

The ferry that crossed the lake back then,

that I thought would have wings,
making my father smile, is gone,

but I see that smile today, remembering.

The shore is still lined with weeping willow,

watered by the tear-streaked dreams of my youth.

My mother was so beautiful then,

with her long blonde curls and big blue eyes,

like a movie star, but fraught, at 

what alcohol did to my parents' love affair.

There should be nothing here I don't remember.*

Our house looked out across the lake

to the Big Blue Hills. My first dog, Dinky,

a black lab, and two turkey gobblers as big as me,

paced the driveway with me, a turkey on each side,
keeping me safe,
knowing I was too small to be walking there alone.

When my mom came out to check on me,

they spread their wings, flapping, and hissed, 

chasing her back inside.

I had so many dreams, in Kelowna days, 

of how life would be, when pain would have ended,

and happiness would be mine to live.

They did not come true, but ones better

than I ever could have dreamed

arrived instead, taking me on

the most breathtaking journey.

I had so many helpers and guides

to show me the way along a path of awakening,

bright as sunrise over the mountains,

I gasping at the wonder of it.

In old age, now, tears and gratitude 

for all of life, its pleasure, its pain, at times

that will not come again, I awash

at the joy and ache of it, the beauty

of the journey, for all that has been lost,

for the courage of living fully,

and not minding the cost.

Because - as the poet said so reassuringly -

All that is lost is not lost.*

It is sometimes an interesting exercise to take lines from someone else's poem and create a new poem from it.  I was inspired by Richard Blanco's "Looking for the Gulf Motel." I love his work.