Dust

I remember places we went together. Sunshine in the cold air, sitting beside you on bales of
hay, reading my book while you slept. Sweet-warm winds came rolling up to meet us, like kids
laughing up a hill. When you awoke it was like a whole new day beginning. Running through fields,
the long grass sweeping at the skin on my legs. Making circles around gatherings of trees, birch trees
covered with white bark and green leaves that glittered in the light. Scrambling up to the top of a grass-covered hill and down the other side as fast as we could go, arms outstretched like we were flying.
“Come on,” you shouted, laughing, every time we reached the bottom. Up we climbed again, over the
peak, until I leapt in the air and stumbled, surprised at the fluttering of white pain in my ankle,
unsteady. You helped me up, your eyes alight with the wind and your heartbeat.

We headed for home where I lay next to you, curled into your lap, where you stayed all
evening as the sun ushered the night into the living room. You carried me nearly two miles, my head
twisted into the smell of your hair. You who seemed so big back then, who now would reach only to
the top of my forehead, should we find ourselves, somehow, standing side by side.