Mementos

Our lives may end like this, too

Carted away by 1800JunkToGo
Workmen picking up the detritus

Things we've kept far too long

Well that I did, you would
Have thrown them all away
In time's past

We could have kept the memories
Without the stuff

You would have thought
Unbothered by sentiment no longer
Remembered, or maybe

Remembered just enough to make us smile

© Tamara Beck 

March 7, 2014

A Memory Shared

A memory you share with me,

And it is mine as well,

I remember it as you do,

We share it, like the bread at table,

A memory so vivid to us both,

It makes us smile

Frieda sits waiting

David and Frieda on their wedding day

My memory of Frieda

She waits wearing her jacket with the fur collar,

Perfectly still, perfectly made up, her handbag on her lap,

If she is anxious it doesn’t show

She is as still as a statue, her snow white hair neat and combed

Her legs close together, her skirt pulled down,

Her gloves held loosely, rest on her handbag,

Her handbag, by the way, is empty except for a lipstick and her change purse,

She waits for her children to take her out for the holidays,

Perfectly still, perfectly made up, neatly coiffed, she is silent and waiting.

Still, small in her jacket with the fur trim,

Her gloves and her handbag in her lap