My parents had married three days after Valentine’s Day
In 1945. Sixty –six years later my mother carried
Bunches of fresh, bright freesias to my father’s
Grave in Oroville.
He had aspired to be a farmer all his life. in his very old
age,
He pulled himself up for one last act of cultivation
Sowing a dozen bulbs under the bedroom window
Where he still slept
With my mother as he had for most of sixty years.
Soon after, his memory became only a memory to us
And he no longer slept with his wife. As with dreams
My father had had.
He told no one why he planted them there. My mother
Had forgotten about them as they lay dormant
In Natomas’ black soil even as his own memory
Quickly slipped away
With no trace of color, he freesias sat waiting for light
Then exactly one year after my father died, not a few
Robust pioneers burst through the Natomas crust thrusting
His persistence of love.
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