Third Person

The weekend at the beach house
was more than just an autumn getaway;
it was a purging of sorts
and out-of-sorts
and a full embrace of last resorts
for just the two of them.

Saturday was good
but went as the mother knew it would
and as the daughter needed to endure.
Sunday brought a pouring rain
and silent solace to the house
as one stood staring through the pain
with hope's warm cup in both her hands
and love still sleeping in the other room.

By the time her daughter woke,
the sun had broken through the gray
and begged them both to stay and stroll
the boardwalk's damp and puddled planks
to funnel cakes and food stands in a row
and photo booths
where curtains shut out time
and funny faces are forever young;
then further on to a little shop
where something stopped them,
something small
that draped across her open palm
and dripped like sorrow down:
a cross it was for her to wear
(unlike the one she'd have to bear
through what the days ahead would hold).

She clasped it round her daughter’s neck,
and forehead to forehead paused
with blurring eyes that spoke for both of them.
Then turning back and walking close,
their heads at subtle angles to the wind,
arm in arm they walked and talked
until they saw the distant door.

Too soon to let the day be done
and knowing that the setting sun
in truth would bring a difficult dawn,
the notion came to try
the kite they’d planned to fly.
And so the daughter did
there in the cool sand
while mother watched her little girl
(grown up too soon and long ago)
against a scape of sky and sea
and innocence,
laughing at a kite that (just as she)
seemed tethered to this earth by more than string
and wanting more than life itself to soar
and please
and dance upon the breeze
and leave at last the breaking waves
and broken heart below.
.
© Copyright 2007, TK, Patterns of Ink