The was written for dVerse (where I am hopelessly lost on responding and thanking and reciprocating). I could have chosen other poems, but the most recent was probably too intense so we’ll go with this one, which I wrote also for dVerse back at the beginning of December. Many thanks to Kim for this prompt.

I Walk in Echoes

I heard: “Can’t you make her shut-up?” My sister’s husband. He was on leave from the Navy and they were visiting for Christmas. I was the “her,” the one singing in the kitchen because I sang as often as breathed, probably “Superstar” because I’d been watching The Karen Carpenter Story. He was the one with the temper, which made me shudder, so I brewed my tea, scampered happily upstairs to watch television until it was time to walk Smokey the dog.

Winter nights were magical. Conducive to forgetting, reimagining, inventing. Christmas lights everywhere. For some reason, the apartment buildings were the most romantic to me, housing dozens of people with seemingly exotic lives. Fairy lights bright on four feet of balcony. I thought, one day that would be me, living a glamorous life in an apartment.

Now, I walk different dogs, see a different world, especially these days. I’ve long since realized that glamour has more to do with magic than reality. And magic has less to do with glamour than the expansive ability to be, see and, even more, to feel. And, I still sing and ignore, as always, the ones who want me to “shut up.”

White breath hovering,

Stars dance in the sky like snow.

I walk in echoes.