We are looking for your laugh
Trying to find the path back to it
Between drooping trees
Listening for your rustle
Under bamboo
Brush of fig leaves
Feeling your step
On the porch
Natty lantana blossom
Poked into your bu*tonhole
We see your raised face
At both sides of a day
How was it, you lived around
The edge of everything we did
Seasons of ailing & growing
Mountains of laundry & mail?
I am looking for you first & last
In the dark places
When I turn my face away
From headlines at dawn
Dropping the rolled news to the floor
Your rumble of calm
Poured into me
There was the saving grace
Of care, from day one, the watching
And being watched
From every corner of the yard