Window Tableau
In the midst of
a comedy routine,
Dad suddenly feels
he's in the act alone.
He looks
and his son is gone,
gaze fixed on a window tableau:
a bar of soap,
some garlic, a seashell
two paper butterflies
pressed in glass
fly above a wispy fern
a photo of tiny, satin
ballerina slippers
on a towel of rumpled white.
All is washed in cloudy
dappled light
from the muted sun outside
and reflected
in the boy's green eye.
"Yes," spoke a voice
the man had buried inside,
:there is sadness ineluctable
in objects perceived."
The young, clear sighted,
establish moments
of quiet victory
as they decide
to continue,
and invent
the rest of their lives.
In the midst of
a comedy routine,
Dad suddenly feels
he's in the act alone.
He looks
and his son is gone,
gaze fixed on a window tableau:
a bar of soap,
some garlic, a seashell
two paper butterflies
pressed in glass
fly above a wispy fern
a photo of tiny, satin
ballerina slippers
on a towel of rumpled white.
All is washed in cloudy
dappled light
from the muted sun outside
and reflected
in the boy's green eye.
"Yes," spoke a voice
the man had buried inside,
:there is sadness ineluctable
in objects perceived."
The young, clear sighted,
establish moments
of quiet victory
as they decide
to continue,
and invent
the rest of their lives.