An Excerpt from The Lilac Hour
We called it the lilac hour. The name came from my Aunt Delilah, who had a jungle of lilacs in her backyard near the harbor. Every spring, they would open their fragrant buds of deep purple and gentle pink. And so it was that I pointed out those same colors to Zeke as the sun finished dipping deep into the bay and Zeke said, “Yes, the lilac hour.” We were young then, Zeke and I, new to marriage and still a little reckless, and I thought the term
highly romantic.
That spring, Zeke gathered lilacs, bushels of them, from Delilah’s garden and put the petals on our bed. Still dreaming, I awoke to the stubble of his beard grazing my neck and the delicious sweetness rising from those buds. I’ve never been able to pass a lilac bush without thinking of him, and the tenderness of early love. I’ve spent my life looking to find that moment again, that one perfect moment, of lilacs.
That spring was so many years ago that I’ve lost count of them. How were we to know it would be our last? On the morning, a few weeks later, when Zeke kissed me goodbye and drove out into the bay in his lobster boat, how was I to know it would be the last time I’d see him? I visit him every day at the lilac hour. He’s under the biggest oak in the cove graveyard, and I like to imagine him, his arm tucked under his head, lying out under the stars. He knew the names of all those stars and would point out the constellations to me as we lay in the cool grass down behind our cottage.
“If I could follow the stars backwards,” he would say, “they would lead me back to you.”
I think about that now as I put the lilacs I’d clipped from our bush into the pickle jar filled with water and set it behind the gravestone. I believed it then and on some evenings, as the stars lighten into view, I’ve repeated those words. “If I could follow the stars backwards, I’d find you.”
I brush my hand over his name—Ezekiel Snow it says, and etched into the stone above it is a crown of stars.
I don’t know why I do it, exactly. Impulse, I suppose, but I lay myself down in the cool grass, right on top of him. There are no stars yet, though if I wait awhile they will begin to appear. If I count them backwards, will they lead me to that time, back to that one perfect moment?
They say old age takes its toll, and my body is a testimony to this. My old joints ache as I lay back, my old lady bones creak and groan like the riggings of an ancient ship. But there is nothing unsharpened in my memory and if I dwell on it long enough, I can still feel Zeke’s hands caressing my thighs. Callused
from the fishing ropes, they fall tender on the warm damp secret places inside of me. I can feel his lips, soft and sure against my temple. And I can hear him whisper all those sweet love words into the shell of my ear.
highly romantic.
That spring, Zeke gathered lilacs, bushels of them, from Delilah’s garden and put the petals on our bed. Still dreaming, I awoke to the stubble of his beard grazing my neck and the delicious sweetness rising from those buds. I’ve never been able to pass a lilac bush without thinking of him, and the tenderness of early love. I’ve spent my life looking to find that moment again, that one perfect moment, of lilacs.
That spring was so many years ago that I’ve lost count of them. How were we to know it would be our last? On the morning, a few weeks later, when Zeke kissed me goodbye and drove out into the bay in his lobster boat, how was I to know it would be the last time I’d see him? I visit him every day at the lilac hour. He’s under the biggest oak in the cove graveyard, and I like to imagine him, his arm tucked under his head, lying out under the stars. He knew the names of all those stars and would point out the constellations to me as we lay in the cool grass down behind our cottage.
“If I could follow the stars backwards,” he would say, “they would lead me back to you.”
I think about that now as I put the lilacs I’d clipped from our bush into the pickle jar filled with water and set it behind the gravestone. I believed it then and on some evenings, as the stars lighten into view, I’ve repeated those words. “If I could follow the stars backwards, I’d find you.”
I brush my hand over his name—Ezekiel Snow it says, and etched into the stone above it is a crown of stars.
I don’t know why I do it, exactly. Impulse, I suppose, but I lay myself down in the cool grass, right on top of him. There are no stars yet, though if I wait awhile they will begin to appear. If I count them backwards, will they lead me to that time, back to that one perfect moment?
They say old age takes its toll, and my body is a testimony to this. My old joints ache as I lay back, my old lady bones creak and groan like the riggings of an ancient ship. But there is nothing unsharpened in my memory and if I dwell on it long enough, I can still feel Zeke’s hands caressing my thighs. Callused
from the fishing ropes, they fall tender on the warm damp secret places inside of me. I can feel his lips, soft and sure against my temple. And I can hear him whisper all those sweet love words into the shell of my ear.
