Poetry |
Haibun 2
|
As a young kid in Los Angeles, I looked forward every year to lighting sparklers on July Fourth. As soon as my father would bring the new package of metal sparklers home, I’d repeatedly peek in their wooden box, which smelled very new. Since my bedtime in the summer was as soon as it grew dark, we had to start the sparklers as soon as dusk descended. Dad let me light the sparklers in our driveway, behind the blue 1949 Plymouth sedan.
I would run, spin in circles, whipping each sparkler around like a lasso, while my father waved his sparklers less exuberantly. The sparks flitted around like tiny lightening bugs and clicked like faintly crackling firewood, while the air smelled of sweet and acrid smoke. I was allowed only three or four sparklers since my mother thought I’d get too excited to go to sleep. I disagreed. Mom would sit on the small porch cautioning me: “Don’t run too fast. Be careful or you’ll get dizzy or burned.” To which my father would always say, in an even tone, “Honey, it’s okay. They aren’t dangerous, and she’ll settle down.” When a sparkler burned out, it would become a tiny ash, a dull grey worm that looked and felt like crepe fabric; and when I poked the ash, it crumbled and disintegrated like a bubble. This tiny transubstantiation always delighted me.
|
About Mary Heldman
click to read BIO
|
Please Comment
click to open a comment box |