Angels.

And among tears and laughter,

among our joy and our pain,

my mother found the time,

on rainy days mostly,

to tell me about

how as a child,

Her and her friend Whitney,

would dance about their beautiful White Victorian homes,

To Jackson Five,

and how after lemonade and gingerbread cookies on hot summer days,

as the sun was setting,

and as a lavender hue from the sky set on their backyard, covered in dahlias and violets,

they would come to sit on the back porch swing,

and Whitney’s grandmother’s voice,

bathed in honey and affection,

would tell them stories of her adventures as a young girl,

and as night settled and the crickets began their chorus,

as the girls’ hearts slowed and their eyes slowly closed,

she would whisper the moral of the story,

and carry them to their childhood rooms,

on the third floor of their nice White Victorian homes,

and the last thing the girls would feel

on those hot summer nights,
was the warm air in the room,

and Whitney’s grandmother’s smooth dark lips kissing them goodnight,

and her pruned brown hands gripping their shoulders

as she hugged them and whispered


"Angels."