Proustian

At times it seems lucky and unexpected, the past, And who we were then, and what the mind brings Back on an overcast day in late September,

The dense, evanescent clouds shifting overhead, The wind fingering the branches in the live oaks, The little chunks of our childhood selves

Floating to the surface after all these years Like memories that we imagine we imagined, Or tiny bits of metal constellating on magnets.

One moment we are drinking coffee at the window On a wet day falling all around us, the next moment We are putting our heads down on our desks

For story-time, or cleaning our lockers, Or filing into the schoolyard for a fire drill. Soon we are pulling on sleek yellow slickers

And splashing home in the rain to our parents And grandparents. I see a boy throwing his arms Around his grandmother’s neck and hugging her.

He eats sugar cookies that he dunks in milk, And plays in his room by himself now, happily, In a fort that he has built next to his bed. . . .

Sometimes it is enough just to remember There was once a time before we knew about time When the self and the world fit snugly together.