#22 Skin and bone

A lot of experimentation in this one. The body is constructed from a wire skeleton wrapped in wax paper, which I had hoped would have more translucency but because his head, a rock , is so heavy it was difficult to photograph him. The gold and green thing on his shoulder is a tiny parrot that probably fell off of a christmas ornament. Thank you to Joe and Kayla who took me to comanche hill yesterday where we found this and many other beautiful rocks. 

Sketches

pencil sketches etching

a face into the surface,

generic and gray at first but

turning quickly into something

so familiar and so real.

Your face looks back at mine

out of the pile of lines and smudges,

like a photograph or the reflecting pool in Lion King

showing another face but a greater truth, the lines

they've morphed into the face 

I picture every morning when I remember your name

as it is whispered through the air when I wake up,

floating through the open window

on an animated breeze that circles about the room

before settling over my head for me to see

your face there giggling,

that chuckled that put you to sleep and woke you up

Always laughing through life 

and wherever that took you.

Through adventures in the trees

and past storybooks and scraped knees,

the laugh carried you to and from school

and up and down hills.

Baby boy you'd try to hide sometimes in an 

igloo made of snow or in that cubbyhole beneath the porch

but when we'd call your name in search of the sun,

we always knew where you were by the laugh alone,

even if you hadn't left that trail of cookie crumbs

or army men toys trailing behind you

a map and a key to your little boy world,

the solution to the equation that equaled all the laughter.

Waking up night after night to those giggles,

quiet at first until you woke up and saw me sitting

there next to you, where I'd been waiting for when you

couldn't keep that joy inside anymore,

the little laugh turning into waves and waves of it,

we'd laugh together

until you laughed yourself to sleep once more.

and grow heavy in my arms until I came to know the exact 

moment you let go. And my arms would tingle

as they lost feeling as if they were laughing too hard with you.

What did you laugh at all day, and

where did all that joy go?

It went away with you I guess, 

I keep searching for the trail you must have left behind,

maybe one day I'll find it.

I listen for the telltale giggle at every turn

but for now I can still hear it whispered in the breeze.