Anamnesis

Remember the first house we owned and moved into?
The truck that brought our belongings from the hot
and dusty city, the bus we rode with one side
open to the elements and a view of the ravines?

We climbed up and up that mountain road—
breathtaking view of pines, thin ropes
of waterfalls cutting across rock faces.
We couldn’t even name the birds that called,

scandalous as hawkers from the trees’
low branches. For a long while there was
no yard, only dirt; and mud in the wet
season until we could seed

and grass came up, luxuriant; then weeds,
then roses and gardenias. I loved the jasmine
most of all, its trailing arms, the way
a heap of fallen blooms almost resembled

a passel of stars— I didn’t mind
how rooms, for many years, did not have doors.
When the wind blew in, it turned sheer curtains
almost liquid: their panels into rain.

In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.