You would have turned 86 years old today, Mom. Probably would have celebrated with another covert Marlboro on the bench outside your door. Or sipped another red wine while seated at your monstrosity of a wall-unit desk, doing your “stuff.”

A lifetime away from the day I emptied the old house of all of your empty bottles of absolute—during that time you gave up drinking.

Once more, on this second of March, I find myself in orbit around your absence, an undiscovered moon of Mars. Soaring so low I can glimpse the latest landrover’s progress across the arid surface of the red-skied world.

So much like your own progress along the aridity of your propriety. How you had to apply your “face” just to buy groceries. How even your casual house outfits could qualify as others’ dress-up. How your ever-proper image meant everything, despite whatever unreality it covered.

Here I am, standing on Mars, facing you, reminiscing about our last conversation in your room at Helen Hayes Rehabilitation Hospital. That last good conversation we had, on the day you were scheduled to come home.

The homecoming you never had…

a heart

entangled in emptiness

March madness

I’m hosting Haibun Monday over at dVerse. We’re writing our own tribute to Tracy K. Smith’s 2012 Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Life on Mars.

The Pub is open! Come join us!