ma belle

After a rather long struggle with death she surrendered.
She died.
Ceremony was short and somber.
She was buried at her chosen corner next to a cedar tree that she planted on her thirty first birthday.
There is a leaning a tree over the river where she canoed and kayaked every summer.
She never fished.
She hated the thought of pulling a living fish off its playground; to her, it was tyranny to the naught.

He is sad.
He stood there under the evergreen cedar until the sun is lost in the eventide.
He hold the hand of his thirteen year old daughter.
He pressed her left hand in gentle assurance.
Daughter and father walked into waiting car.

Daughter muttered
Her eyes welled up.

There was silence.

Family friends and neighbors have all left.
The emptiness is overwhelming.
They felt reduced to nothingness.
They meandered endlessly on the rooftop.

They came down to bedroom and stared into emptiness.
Her picture on the wall is oriented a little crooked.
They fixed it with care.
They closed eyes and opened their nose wide;
They smelled the smell;
They kissed the picture.

Brevity of a long night ...

They slept.

Next morning.
There was a jewelry box on the dining table.
Missing key.

Looking for the key; it soon was an obsession for them.
After a certain time, it felt to be invasion of a dead person's privacy.
They should respect; they agreed.

But one beautiful evening,
when the sun about to die into a crepuscular night,
it was high tide;

the box was hammered opened ...

There was a book.
There was a page marked.
There was a dry flower with a golden inscription

ma belle