Praise Song

I want to praise the things that won’t last
My son’s long hair,
curling in unrecognizable ways,
moving as if by its own will
Dinners together and at a decent time-
not rushed burrito barreling toward a field on 128
Walking the dog with someone from my family at 2:00
on a breezy summer afternoon
The tiny red flowers on the cactus my husband rescued from St. John Street
Waking up late
Staying up late
Teaching one son how to make
the chocolate cake he likes
and the other how to clean a toilet
How could I have not known
that my older son always take the Kamchatka Peninsula in Risk
and Tennessee Avenue in Monopoly
and will always win?
The lines the mower leaves on the grass
The chalked messages of hope on the sidewalk
and on the path into the park
Reading a novel in one sitting
Not knowing what day it is
The time to make this poem

Gia Batty is an educator at the Noble and Greenough School in Dedham, Massachusetts.