Today's a soft day

Today’s a soft day after so many hard ones

As soft as the cool skin above mom’s elbow

As a tiny boy I would go to sleep between mom and dad

With my fingers clinging to her smooth arm

I would wake up in my own bed

But they let me fall asleep between them

I lived between them for seventeen years

And then one day I woke up in a bed in Morehead

Longing both for what was to come

And what had been

-my little space in the bed between them

The cool skin above mom’s elbow