Claire Scott

My Mother’s Ashes

pale grains in a pine
box on my mantle next
to a photo taken on Coney Island

smiling on the boardwalk 1955
her wide skirt wind-whipped
the Ferris wheel frozen in
          black & white time

each spring I take the train to Brooklyn
with a tiny bag of bone bits & scraps
          stingy with the amount
          tense with anticipation

I taste a crumb before I scatter
onto the barren beach
coarse cinders sweet/sour
          on my tongue

I savor my mother’s ashes
like butterscotch melting
in the corner of my mouth

I live for that trip to Coney Island
carrying ashes in a ziplock bag
          stingy/savoring
I will never be done with
          letting go

 

Claire Scott is an award winning poet who has been nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize. Her work has been accepted by the Atlanta Review, Bellevue Literary Review, Enzagam and Healing Muse among others. Her first book of poetry, Waiting to be Called, was published in 2015.