Trespass

No dogs allowed but I brought her
and we walked past all the Our Town people
Merrill Walker Smith Morse Peabody
here lies with his wife
and the babies who lived for just months
with small angels with
tilted heads beside them.
The school bus drove past,
and leaves softly fell,
and we shuffled through.
The sun set beyond the yellow maples
and the man played golf on the other side
of the headstones,
hitting the ball and walking slowly
on the low lawn.

I found someone I knew.
She was who I would want to be,
generous and respected with only kind words
and gifts and an easy smile given to anyone.
I met her when I was just married,
at a seasonal museum
where a very old docent and I would sit and wait for cars to pull up,
for them to ask about the family,
the mother and husband,
the boy who was shot, or shot the mother.
I don't remember.

She came to the house to organize a tag sale
for the Colonial Dames.
I'd never heard of Colonial Dames
or a tag sale.
Women who had families
who had been on the Mayflower
brought antiques.
Not musty clothes from their basements or Avon cologne bottles shaped like cars or
record albums like Petula Clark or the Bee Gees. These were
ink wells and trivets and andirons and willow ware and tapestries.

She gave me
a china cup so thin I could see my fingers through it
and a candy dish from France
and an emerald green marble desk set she said
I was to give to my husband for our anniversary.

She'd lost her grandson to AIDS
when it was new and he was young,
and she made a home for young men dying.
And she wore a feather boa
And she invited me to her house for tea.

I walked past her today
where she lies with her husband,
and school children ride by,
and dogs chase squirrels,
and the sun lowers itself
into the ground.