Melancholy Mornings

      In my dream, we are all sitting together around the outside fire pit, flames casting orange flickers of light and shadow across the faces of the people I love. Marshmallows burst into flame, fiery torches of sticky deliciousness, carefully blown out and stuffed into laughing mouths before the next fluffy morsel is pokered and set over the embers. Memories are shared, denied, blamed on his sister, her brother, the wind, and laughed off as the next tale is told. 

     In my dream, I sit quietly watching them all, but focusing on two. I see their faces, one on the verge of manhood and the other solidly there. I note their similarities, wonder how my son might have evolved into the man my brother had become. 

     In my dream, I know it is only a dream. That came with time, with years of dreams that left me panicked, trying to fight my way back to them upon waking.

     Over the years of without, I’ve learned to let my dream-self enjoy these reprieves, soak in the moments I am blessed with, acknowledge without panic that it will end too quickly when I wake in the morning and they are still gone. 

     The disappointment I feel on these mornings no longer leaves me gutted for days, dehydrated with the shedding of grief. Instead, though heavy resolve settles upon me, it is lightened with the smile of memory leftover in the scent of burning wood and the taste of roasted mallows upon my tongue.