POEM #29-BYGONES

"Anniversary"

Really, my love?

You don't remember

how we slipped rings
onto each other's fingers

in front of Judge Hobbs
that day some fifty years ago?

Or how I licked the sticky frosting
off your fingers after we cut the cake?
How the tin cans on the bumper
rattled as we drove away
from the church that afternoon?

Well, perhaps you remember
me carrying you across the threshold
or the musty wet-dog smell
of the rug in our motel room
on our honeymoon that weekend?
Do you remember how your father
bought dinner for us that first night?
His eyes tears as he handed me
the folded twenty-dollar bill
our first night as man and wife,
"Have a steak on me, tonight," he said.

Do you remember laying next
to me in the bed that first night
or ten thousand after that?
How our bodies fit together,
knew each other,
Loved,
created life,
loved,
warred,
loved again.

Today's our anniversary, dear.

Surely you remember us?

(c) Carol Wilcox, 2016