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Your childhood: fables told in hushed voices.

The lake beside your home, the garden where

Mother used to pluck tomatoes with thumb

and forefinger, and the valley where

the crystals of your innocence shattered. 
 

The little woman who peered from behind

curtains woven of orange, the gardener

who trimmed with benevolence the bushes

of tulips and roses, the carpenter

who flung paint from rooftops—where are they now? 
 

Father toiling in the vineyard, the crooked

tombstones multiplying on forgotten

grounds, snow falling indiscriminately

and frightening inhabitants of the forest

into an eternal hibernation. 
 

A family seen walking pensively.

Mother wore a black bonnet and earrings.

A bachelor button tucked behind your ear.

Equivocal tears dancing above rosy cheeks.

Sunset trembling in your moist, opal eyes. 
 

Today, the flowers still whisper your secret.

That same breeze still runs through your hair

as over the strings of a harp. The same

incumbent solitude upon your soul

still dreams of glorifying its persona.