The Day of Sharing Words

TWO WOMEN ON THE BELL TOWER BEACH



I arrive at the Bell Tower

and they go on

talking about some silly thing they did

when they were girls. One keeps saying,

remember, remember?



The ferry glides

serenely by, brimming with tourists

gathered on deck for a feast of seeing the way of our town.



When the other woman says,

Oh, I don't know if he ever really loved me...

I turn to go

because he must be her husband.

But the other leans in, caresses her friend's hand,

kisses it lightly, says, your father loved you,

and I don't knowy why I feel relieved

but I do.



After a pause, I walk on.

Their voices follow, especially the laughter

(so elated, so shared) bubbling

with affection, the champagne

of intimacy.



Because of their bond

no loneliness invades my aloneness. I bend

to pick a few daffodil buds

carry them home



and later on my sill

they swell open and beam

like candles.



Mary Lou Sanelli

from Craving Water: Poems of Ordinary Life in a Northwest Village