Dad Mowing
| He pushed his sleeves up Sunday afternoons and
put to rights each tired week's havoc. The subtle sshhrr of hand-honed blades sent greetings up and down the summer street where neighbors rocked on porches sipping tea, the mower's whirr a counterpoint |
| to talk about their children and the heat. Dad
mowed slow, each bump and dip of lawn familiar as a lover's thighs -- paused to wipe a handkerchief behind his neck, arms propped against wood handles, with no more wish to be elsewhere |
| than if he'd been a stone in a Zen garden. The
bumblebees, displaced, hovered and fussed, the scent of fresh-cut grass drove children wild, and Dad would smile and mow around the patch he called free wishes -- dandelions, common as stars. |
-Susie Hunter