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A Timeless Scene (poem)

By Christopher Mehne

She sits staring across the room at nothing in particular
the National Geographic open, text down
in her bath-robed lap.
Somewhere outside dogs bark stupidly,
and the last diesel sounds down the tollgate grade
big timber mill-bound.
In her eyes gleams a thoughtful scintilla
for years now gone
deeds done.
For men known
and those loved.
For the one who had married his soul
to hers, now gone.
Settling deeper she shifts in the over-stuffed chair
the familiar yellow magazine sliding
into a crevice formed between thigh and upholstery.
A deep sigh moves through her body
as the first evening chill sweeps down valley slopes
fresh from snowfields melting.
A well -used country hand sweeps a silver touched honey strand
from forehead's freckled side;
slowly she reached for the frame of brass
nearby on the table's oaken top.
        a young man
        in military combat garb
        war etched face
        and a scrawling notation
                "just before we took the refinery at...
                your loving son..."
Her eyes close
and when they open, steady run the tears down
sun-tanned cheeks,
sobbing
deep, hurt, lonely and forever.
a mother's lament.
She turns towards the center of the table
  there the folded cloth triangle
   a walnut box of medals and ribbons
    and that so official looking paper.
Outside the dark envelops the land.
The dogs sounding meaner and nearer.
A full moon rises brilliant
filling the night
with elusive shadows, dissolving dreams
and fading memories.

—Christopher Mehne