#161

These children
like fireflies between my fingers
only twinkle for a minute
and I have to catch it.
Hours sending lessons
into careless wind and dropping
songs like stones into rivers
that only rush over them

Insignificant.

So often
seemingly
insignificant

I am reduced to
reverberations
rolling vaguely behind their hazy eyes
swishing out in low-rise tides
“did you hear what I said?”
they did,
they say
And sporadically, when asked
sometimes
they can play back
a jumbled mix track tape they
(luckily)
(subconsciously)
recorded –
and surprise us both
but they

are fireflies flickering
on my palms
only twinkling for a minute
and as much as every fiber in my fingers
long to pluck it, stuff it
into mason jars filled with moments
that I could open on those long and
hollow, expansive days –
that I could play
back to them when Hanon
isn’t as bright
as the Harry Potter theme –
I refrain

Such infrequent
fragile light
is not my job
to ignite,
but my reward –
and my responsibility
to preserve