if I could go home again

I would

drink the green lawn

rub the sun on my skin

like it was butter

bathe in the sky

scrub with the clouds

I would

swing on my maple tree

a sapling when I was seven

later, an extensive canopy

Dad planted a tree

for each of us

the Dogwoods were the boys’

I took those for granted

until I sat in the blue chair

where I read

that the bloom

was the Cross,

I went out

looked at one

saw the nail holes

I would

pluck one dogwood bloom

for my hair

and gather a bouquet of tulips and daffodils

dandelions, black eyed Susans and

Queen Anne’s lace

watch the sun set over the woods

I could

imagine the spirits of the 2 mallards

the three cats buried

the many corpses

of their Rabbit victims

imagine all their spirits dancing

our child selves too

with glass jars for fireflies

and toads