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Frances Wilson

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Wanting the Moon

Barely an hour till the Intercity south
will snap these three days shut,
leaving me at long distance.  But time enough
for that promised walk to the shop,
a consolation for us both,
though she doesn’t yet know it.

The back street’s badly lit,
but she won’t take my hand, two years
and a month of trust even of the dark, skips
ahead.  While I watch out for pitfalls,
till a kerb tricks her and she trips,
picks herself up.  But now she wants me to.

And I’m down on my knees like a shot.
Her breath on my neck.  Her weight.
The night.  We’re both near tears, so I wave
at our shadows, wavering across the road.
But she points higher, bounces her delight
at a silver crescent rocked on a surf of cloud.

Weeks later my daughter tells me
they watched it again, from a window,
full now.  How she cried, ‘Not that one.
I want Grannie’s moon’.  And I’m glad,
wanting her to remember, to miss me, but wishing,
impossibly wishing she might never be sad.

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