at twelve years old, I kept a diary for 12 months, every day scratching down the kids and people I met, sports played, schoolwork, mom and dad moments, a laundry list of activities in the packed timeline of a child’s day I notice now, I never wrote after supper, never sat in my room as bedtime loomed, never left emotional commentary, the classic time for reflection, the closed journal on my desk, sealed to my own depths a girl would have plowed into their secrets, used in

we measure human life by their accomplishments and the size of their heart although even with nothing significant given to the world, it’s love that holds the measuring stick not for the head held high for all it’s done but to calculate its width, its spread and girth, of the lives it’s touched

triple knock at the door my therapist, Bernard, and I had just finished I walk over, turn the handle FedEx I sign, take the box bring it to the coffee table Oh, that’s her ashes, he says I loved his Linda who passed a couple weeks earlier she, too sweet and full of joy, to be stuffed inside a square of cardboard we sit say nothing Linda quiet too our silent reunion