haiku retrospective cdxxxiii

single place setting
she lifts her water glass
to her reflection

What is missing in my haiku is my father.

My very sociable mother had to come to terms with being alone after my father's death in 2009. Her dining room is a room of many mirrors. I imagined her, with her table neatly set for herself, lifting her water glass to her reflection before eating her solitary supper. I replaced the wine (her beverage of choice with her evening meal) with water to underscore the aloneness in the haiku.

I am happy to report that my mother has a new boyfriend as of December and is no longer having to come to terms with her loneliness.

Funny that I set this haiku in the dining room. My mother keeps my father's ashes in a fancy soup tureen on the sideboard. She had no other place to keep them in her small apartment, and she didn't want to put my dad in the closet.

Since my father's death, she has been taking film canisters of his ashes to all the places they loved, all around the world, and scattering them. It was a centering activity for her, a way of remembering and letting go.

manhattan park bench
she points out the flower bed
where she put his ashes

Recently, she has been talking about scattering the remainder of his ashes in one place. I guess she is really ready to let him go.

Her new love calls her frequently when she is out and about in her busy life. She talks about him incessantly, stars in her eyes.

cell phone chime
she blushes when i mime
a tiny violin

12 February 2012