Missing

my parent's wedding bands

Missing Peggy

I don’t remember the first time I heard
The delicate sound
Of my mother’s wedding band, made with dentist’s gold,
Clacking gently against hard surfaces like paint brushes and palettes
(she was an artist, mostly painting in acrylic and watercolor)
Or the kitchen sink
As she washed the dishes.
She was a dental technician for about ten years, carving teeth,
making molds of bridges and dentures.
Her boss helped her make their wedding bands
as his wedding present to them;
A pair of plain, shining, gold bands.
I loved those rings. I wanted my wedding band to look just like that;
Unadorned,
Someday, like an eternal promise of fidelity
That doesn’t know that selfish options exist,
But instead, quietly, shows up
And loves, with no expectation of reward or recognition.
Her death was almost a year ago,
But today, again, I had a stray thought
That I hadn’t had for a while,
That I wanted to call her.
“Oh, that’s right. She’s gone.”
I’m fifty-five. She was eighty-five.