So many times I have tried to look at you in the face.
And figure out what’s your purpose is here.
And to live in the now.
She was once a child. From a small cow town. Where cows lived at. Where cows grazed. And as she turned around she noticed now there are no more cows here.
Even with her tall heels on she was ready like when she was a child, to go dancing.
Ready for that man to pick her up and whisk her around in a crowded room like a hand picking daisies.
Beat that foot on the bottom rim, in time with the music, in time with that hand.
She sung out in many words, they were once hymns to her.
Pulling her red dress across that street, proud in those brand new shoes, as a small child.
“That’s my babyâ€Â, her mama said.
As her mother pulled by and told her not to cross the street.
Not to pass go. But ears ringing with her own song with her own breath she didn’t listen.
And crossed, pushing go.
The green car ambled closer to her as the man pulled on his brown pipe, the one indented with fingertips and old tobacco stains, worn like years looking through old and bitter window panes.
It had a taste to it and he liked holding it there, feeling it close to his thoughts. Sloshing it around like an old friend, talking on his porch.
It passed time you know.
Looking through the brown tinted windshield, a hush fell over him; it was quiet like angels were ready to take their bows in some sacred pew.
And he thought he saw a glimpse of red, like some profane march or warning sign dancing in front of him.
“He didn’t see me†she said
Her body hit the rim, in time with the music, in time with the sound of the car, in time with the hushed embrace.
And in that moment she noticed that time held so much distance.
Time was her mama’s arms and in that second it held so much grace, so many thoughts, so many times.
And she thought “God please let me live for my children, my children my innocent beautiful children, I love.â€Â
The car hit her, and time moved on.
The silence fell in with noise, as if time was trying to drink back in what was lost.
Her mom yelled twice, once in 1987 and once in 2004, and those two times merged into one inaudible scream.
And her mama remembered holding onto thoughts her baby’s red dress, fell crumpled in her arms, a 9 year old girl. Laying there in front of black tires, that had no name on them; her child’s name was not written on them!
And she saw for the second time, now 2004, her daughter lying down on blacked out concrete, like some large dark horrendous bed, she was resting quietly, she held the grown woman; her beautiful child and cried.
Again the black tires, she saw, resting by her child’s body. And here the face of a man, who did not know her daughters name.
Him. The one who did not know her daughters laugh, or the smile on her children’s faces when mommy came through the door.
Just ashes she said.
And thought
Perhaps maybe, just maybe I will get another chance
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