Let’s see. I could say, any and every time
I was near the sea – the magical ocean.
Or when I rose on tiptoe
to sniff deeply of a rose from my father’s
beautifully tended bushes.
Or when the moon shone full and bright
through my bedroom window
and I would stay awake
to moon over pen and paper, gazing
out at the night sky and making poems.
It might have been before I was four,
for that was when my dear, kind Nana died.
So much colour and warmth
faded from my life then – the kind
only she could give. That death cost me dear.
All these memories from childhood….
It’s fair, too, to say
that after I fare-welled infancy
to have one of my own,
I thought I’d won the lottery! (I still do.)
His father’s blue eyes shone with joy.
(The First-born's and mine are green-brown hazel.)
I felt so green, so raw, so unprepared –
but I delved into the mine of my own
good memories to unearth what was needed.
When and where was I happiest?
If it’s a riddle, I give in.
There’s no one answer. Each
of these occasions, and many more,
give me happiness over and over again.
The NaPoWriMo prompt for this day asked us to respond to one of a collection of 'Proust Questions.' I chose the one that is the title of my poem. (What could be nicer than going over one's moments of happiness in memory?)
The Poem A Day prompt is to use homonyms. Explanation: ''A homonym is either (or both) a homograph (word spelled the same with different meanings and possibly different pronunciations) or a homophone (word that is pronounced the same but has different spellings).'