It’s not that I don’t want to.

The mix isn’t right.

Too much salt.

I’m dried up…

But I don’t want to be.

The after burn is gone.

No tracks to trace.

No liquid pearls.

At one point in each visit

our eyes would well.

We sat across the table

and shared life stuff.

We wouldn’t wipe them.

We would pluck each

others, like grapes,

and set them gently down.

No allowing them to run away.

We would cup our hands

under each others chin

and let them fall.

It was then I could see

her face in my hands.

My reflection revealed

in her pool of tears.

She drew mine to her mouth

and sipped with a smile.

I laughed and washed

my face with her liquid salt.

When I was a child she used to say, “Oh, dry up!”  Yet, since we became more than mother and son, our tears often entered our conversations.  She no longer said, “Oh, dry up!” but joined with me and I with her.  I know I wasn’t the only one who sat across from her at the table of tears AND laughter!

© Gerald Allen Barrett and parentheticallyspeakingin3d, 2012.