Reading Romain Gary(1914-1980) At My Old Home

I sit on the red-painted floor in the now almost empty room

where I once, as a child afraid of the night, held my mother's warm hand

each night as I fell asleep. Now,

from a dusty book-shelf I pick up a book by Romain Gary,

one I never finished, and read how his mother - so proud of him -

embarrassed him before his air force comrades in 1939,

announcing  'You will be a second Guynemer!'

So lucky those of us, who still can be

embarrassed in public by loving mothers

bursting with their pride towards us,

the undeserving... It's evening, the shadows

gather, grow larger. The sea, harsh

like the reality we encounter after leaving the years

when our mothers could still protect us from suffering,

hits the coast at Big Sur. He has twenty-one years

to live, that son of a proud mother, who

once wore the air force leather jacket. On

that December day still

to come there was no proud mother
 to hold his hand as he faced
the night.

30.06.2017