This: an ordinary pink rose.
I don't know it's variety except hybrid tea.
And unremarkable, except for the fact
that every spring now for 26 years,
when I smell this first of many blooms,
I think immediately of sitting on the couch
with my five sisters, when we all fit on a single
couch at the same time!
Every year, it's the same.
A scent like apples still on the branch,
and lemons. And there we are,
laughing, elbowing, making room for each other.
And there was a time when we all fit.
lovely! we were all so tiny once....
ReplyDeletebus fumes always made me think of grade school -- good times.
Tara, bus fumes remind me of taking the bus to downtown Seattle with my mom — just the two of us! — before I was old enough for school. I still have a tendency to want to inhale them, just to evoke the memory. Pollution!
DeleteI'm blessed with a very acute sense of smell, so can appreciate your recalls. It happens to me in the strangest of places, by the strangest of aromas.
ReplyDeleteCro, I believe that scent is one of the most powerful memory triggers. I have a little bottle of cologne that I received as a birthday gift from a friend when I was in the second grade. It's lived in my dresser drawer for 49 years. It was a surprise party, and when I open the bottle, the thrill of that first surprise is present once again.
DeleteSix sisters? Wowza.
ReplyDelete