Terror Of Summer Poem by Aida Santos

I think of you
in this season of penitence
the basketball court
below the apartment
surprisingly ceases for the day
lent brings back many summers
when the sun flails against
the windowpanes,
unceasing in its summer terror

there are memories that bring joys:
the beaches we went to
in your childhood
the terror then were the waves
engulfing your frail bodies
and you bobbed up and down
my heart in a moment of panic
and then gone, as your heads
float, with smiles as big as the sea.

i don’t have to leave this little room
to hear the splashing of the waters
or to listen to your laughter.
you had fled the foolishness of age
that most mothers dread
and now in this room
i dread the foolishness
of my memories
as you create new seas
and waves that you conquer
splashing in waters of lives
that are only yours
recalling all this
in the terror of this summer.