shake those tail feathers.

peonies remind me of childhood & my mother. my mother loved those peonies way back in the 1970s. i loved them because she did.

i am 8 years old & sitting on cold, dark green grass, the taste of the blades so sweet at first, then tasting of old gum. doesn’t matter though, there were enough blades of grass as stars in the night sky. i can see the black ants crawling over those tightly closed buds. watching them work their magic. I can hear the birds. i can feel a cool breeze, gentle as a blown kiss. I can see Berlin Pond through the trees, blue mirroring the blue from above.

I can remember the feeling of sitting on the front lawn waiting for the buds of her peonies to open so that I could smell them. I sit here, at my desk, 35 years later & remember everything as though I am in two places at once. I can smell those peonies from here. They smell as sweet as they look.