Friday, March 03, 2017

mmdcxcviii

       If my legs aren’t long is no
     see how long.      a crowd.
                           —Susie Timmins

My mother cannot walk
the way she used to,
perhaps like most of us.

And I haven’t been able
to afford to get her a
ticket to visit me

in something like five
years.  When she’d
visit regularly, she

seemed to really
love it (Who wants
to travel constantly

back to Arkansas from
San Francisco?  Especially
when one’s first trip abroad

was at 40 [and to Paris!!]);
we’d walk up and down the
hills in the City of the Seven

Hills.  Or, in more recent
visits, we’d hold soirees
for her in the apartment

(the one in which I'm currently
sitting).  Anything could act
as an excuse to have one (e.g.,

"Hey, everybody, Mom's here!").
We'd taxi often to brunches,
lunches, dinners, and suppers. 

And there was always the "day
trip" — often to Sonoma and
Calistoga.  Or down south

for some fresh strawberries,
gotten roadside, over which
she never tired of swooning.