Each day is a fleeting stack
of moments
that replaces itself
like a card trick.
The way my son
asked his dad tonight
if those scoundrels
were still bugging him.
And how his little sister
blows kisses
at trees.
That he asks me
to fill him up
with good thoughts
so that no bad dreams
can get in.
And how she says no
all twangy
like a Bjork song.
I see now
how my mother
must have felt,
sliding photos of me
into envelopes
that she let me drop
into the mailbox.
She never included a note to him
but the message was clear:
How can you bear
all that you have missed?