Mom's Verse

Mom sat there, contented in her institutional lifestyle,
Mind sharp as ever, her body has had better days.
I think this is what I might be like in 32 years.
My being is more like a clone of her.
One day in my early teens, I walked into the old Madison store, a department store.
A woman started screaming. She thought she had seen a ghost.
My Mom 30 years younger. It was me. The lady scared me a little
just because she made such a fuss. Normally, I am not afraid of ghosts
except in scary movies with the creepy music.

Anyway, the last night of our visit, we had supper with Mom and Dad
in the activity room.
Mom blessed the conversation with one of her favorite verse pairs
from The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Right off the top of her head,
unhesitatingly perfect with her pretty song voice,
I am sure the verse varied a tiny bit from what I found on the web.
Mom is an afficiaonado of the verse variations.
Still,
The message still so true.
The translation by Edward Fitzgerald, a story all by himself.


XVI.




I sent my Soul through the Invisible,

Some letter of that After-life to spell:

And by and by my Soul return'd to me,

And answer'd "I Myself am Heav'n and Hell:"





LXVII.



Heav'n but the Vision of fulfill'd Desire,

And Hell the Shadow from a Soul on fire,

Cast on the Darkness into which Ourselves,

So late emerged from, shall so soon expire.