SOUVENIR

 

Take me back to that night

back to the river – with its

sleek stones for skipping across the water,

summer trees reaching bank to bank,

and me, a teenager then,

sitting on the sandbar

beneath someone else’s stars.

 

I did not belong there that night,

not for a moment,

but still l slipped a smooth river rock

into the front pocket

of my jeans

and carried it home.

~ Cheryl Unruh