Shopping for Mother’s Day, circa 1975

My hand in another, larger, we walked
down to the strip mall – kingdom of retail
essentials: lottery tickets and newspapers,
bagels and donuts, nail artists lying in wait,
pizza and the chachkies – sweet-faced
statuary, tiny glass animals with delicate
wings. It was a time of collecting, an era
when curio cabinets itched to be filled
with something like beauty. Plates painted
somewhere far away, blooming in precise
gold petals, candles with fluted edges
that hoped never to be burned. I shopped
with serious intent and skipped home
with my selection sure she would cherish
this miniature crystal horse,
fragile as a foal just-birthed and wrapped
neatly in white tissue paper.
On the day, I presented it, like a brand new
idea, one that could carry us through
this decade of mystery, through anything
life might posit.

Nov 22, 2013

One of 30 poems in 30 days