Comments upon scattering -

my mother taught me thievery:
the way of taking without others knowing.

the silver pitcher from Galatoire's
crawled into her purse between coffee and the check
and glints on my shelf.
A New Orleans evening is caught in the silver,
and where the cream used to flow I can see
the swirl of her white skirt as she crossed Bourbon Street.
Tinted the color of wide Houston skies
it shimmers the shade of walls
she painted when I was young.
It's handle
is the curve of my first lover's shoulder
who now is as parceled
as her favors once were.

So I wonder as I keep collecting
where has she hidden
the myriad of things she has taken from my hands?
The hedges in London where I hid from the rain
and the gray Moroccan robe shielding me from the sun
are covered by the shading of green in her eyes.
And the stuffed security of Sherman,
the tattered felt dog,
is muted like the pain of my one high school love
by the wondrous envelopment of her
signature perfume
as she crossed through the kitchen and out onto the lawn.

But these cruelties are moments;
just objects in my mind.
I see that her greatest theft of all
was stolen as it was given:
a son's first stumbled leaving,
printed like the silver
by her gleaning fingertips.



2/5/91
GLS