A tiny, delightful girl named Alma lives across the street from me. She loves my huge, wild garden, especially the small ceramic fox who keeps guard over it. She likes to pick up the fox, hug it, lug it to a different patch of flowers, and set it back down. Alma just became a big sister, and I imagine her teaching her little brother how to say “Alison’s house” when he begins to talk.

This poem brought so much back to me, momentary flashes of memory swimming up. But it was little Alma I thought of when I looked out the window at the lamplit apartment where she was probably going to bed. A long time from now, when I’m no longer and she’s weeding her own garden, will the memory of the little fox she loved so much come swimming up?

The Past Is Still There, by Deborah Garrison

I’ve forgotten so much.
What it felt like back then,
what we said to each other.

But sometimes when I’m standing
at the kitchen counter after dinner
and I look out the window at the dark

thinking of nothing,
something swims up.
Tonight this:

your laughing into my mouth
as you were trying
to kiss me.

Today’s poem, The Past Is Still There is from The Second Child, by Deborah Garrison, published by Random House. 

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