After My Grandmother's Funeral

My daughter discovered a pair
of wings in her shawl. She ran
to me and showed how they flapped,
so I lifted her up and let her fly.
She had to flap hard in the still
air of the mausoleum
and nearly fell twice, moth-like
diving and darting up again.
She worked so hard, she may have
forgotten me underneath her
with hands overhead holding
her up. When she came down
she made a memory of something
she’d never done. Her brain
made a place for the wings.

Sometimes they itch like missing limbs.
When I held her up and danced her
around the marble walls where
the missing bodies of flying souls lie,
I felt the stumps my old wings,
at the shoulder blades, ache a little
just as everyone here in the walls did
until they set their children down
the last time and vanished
into the still air shining with motes
of memories both real and imaginary–
and indistinguishable.