A Bean Hollow Goodbye

My poem, A Bean Hollow Goodbye, was originally published in 2002 by Potpourri Literary Magazine. It was written after I helped a dear friend spread the ashes of her son into the ocean at Bean Hollow State Park. S. Goldberg (2002) Erato Literary Magazine

A gray on gray Pacific coast morning begins
as new yellow flowers push
from beneath scarlet ice plant fingers,
and a mother says goodbye to her son’s ashes.

The hard sandstone hole
where ancient women washed clothes
compassionately holds her knees
and catches drops of her impenetrable sorrow,
as she watches young pups bob in the green sea
while adults watch her watching them.

She tries to understand.
Understand how decisions
become who we are and will become.
Tries to understand how birth needs death.
Tries to let go of memories as fresh as the salt air she breaths,
but cannot.

Alone, though with friends,
she tries to say goodbye,
but will not.
Will not say goodbye to herself.

As the wind touches her cheek
she looks at what once was joined to her soul,
and with a movement from somewhere else,
he descends in beautiful, sweeping billows
to a rich sea that mirrored his life,
as bait fish move into enclosed spaces,
and floating plants, without attachments
aimlessly drift.

Only the tidal sounds are heard as she softly says,
“Bean Hollow,
a good place to say goodbye”.

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