What is it about things?
Keepsakes placed in drawers,
randomly, about the house–
shells, rocks, old buttons–
that you can hold
in your hand and feel:
the smoothness
the ridges
the thinness
the thickness
the edge
of things–

What is it?

That rock found at a creek
near Fuller Lake
when you lived in Pennsylvania
a lifetime ago,
the shell you found in South Carolina,
on a beach with your second husband,
another one–pink abalone on the inside,
darkest blue on the outside, a delicate mussel
from Star Island, pale green and cobalt
beach glass, a chip of heavy China from a ship.

And, that large brown button
that fell off your great aunt’s coat
as she boarded the train from Chicago
to Buffalo–you were ten.  It was cold.

Before she tucked you into bed,
the night before,
she described what it was like
to board the Maid of the Mist, 
buckling up in big yellow raincoats, 
hearing the roar of the falls,
the great spray of Niagara, 
clouding your eyes.