If the last sound I hear is a whir of sparrows, an all-at-once ascent
from the apple tree, air pulsing above the branches, it would be a kind
of permission. Like the luff of a sheet flung above the bed, again
and again. That great whoosh of air takes me far out on the water,
the sail breathing in and out. Coastline fading like memory.
Light sifts through the blinds tonight the way my mother sifted cake flour
into a blue porcelain bowl. A dusting of twilight now on the chair, across
the vanity. In her last days my mother swore she saw wings on the wall
of her hospice room. First, it was a large bird. Later, an airplane. Look,
she would say, hoisting herself up on her elbows, can’t you see the wings
there on the wall? Not a shadow of wings, but actual wings. She was insistent.
It’s just the light playing tricks, Mom. What else could I say?
But I’ll admit that sometimes I can see the moon fall across the water,
even though I live inland from the shore. I hear its swash, the riffle of pebbles.
A commotion of gulls.
