I am your guest now, Mama, and not your son. A guest you expect to visit this morning you marked red on the calendar.
Surprised, I can see you have kept the old, unsightly chattels inside locked rooms -- like emotions forlorn in your breast.
You have also changed the drapery and tablecloth that seemed to cover the house with more anguish.
The soft carpet spreads across the living room welcoming me into a long-forgotten place.
Smiling, you lead me to the dining table and we sit comfortably the way you would have cuddled me on your lap when I was young but never did.
Later, the maids will serve the food and pour water into empty glasses to banish our hunger and thirst away but our souls never get filled.
I wonder if you would let me fiddle with the gold cobiertos and china you had kept untouched in these old cabinets.
These cabinets into which I gazed as a young child lost in deep, consuming thought -- through the still glass unsplintered as your heart.
