Ghosts

Soak my spirit
in fragrance of a day like today
where grass and air fill my nose with scent
like sweat on the collar of a shirt
and with the history
of every traveler that has stepped
past this place
captured in that smell.

Conversations cross with speed
in these breezes,
a neighbor or a lover
nearly missing each other
most days.

In this moment,

right now,

I am here and talking to myself.
In the same moment the mind tunes in

knowing

we are all ghosts,
simple specters,
of so many lives.

I have drifted
past myself again today,
or is it you,
or is it my mother
or your mother.

Perhaps it is all the women
who have ever loved us

that mother
left standing and smiling
at the left shoulder
waiting for someone
to need her like I need
that much love.

I will place my hand
in that hand
and walk
quietly home.