Hilary brought mom and dad
from Ashland
where for the last decade
they’d been useful in her home
as bookends and paperweights—
we scattered them on a hillside
mom’s wish
at the junction of two toppled redwoods
in Founder’s Grove above
the West fork of the Eel River
then covered them with pine needles
without ceremony or song
to be washed by storms to come
carbon atom by carbon atom
down the hillside into the Eel River,
and from there to the Pacific—
mom and dad
rising as seeds of incandescent rain
finding their way into the water
I might use someday
to make my morning coffee
which I may drink with cream and sugar
or maybe black
unable to decide if I should read
the New York Times or
plant chrysanthemums.
~
