Shopping with Mom

I can’t shake the persistent refrain
Of this one fleeting thought
Which froze my fingers mid-motion,
Turning over a price tag
On a discount Banana Republic dress.

Looking at you over a stack of neatly folded sweaters
Your face lined with graceful
Surrender and knowledge,
And my heart aching for us to always have one another
Like this —

And one piercing thought, like a clove
Into the skin of an orange on display:
That these dishcloths we are buying, these shoes from Brazil,
Even if they end their journey in a landfill,
They will survive us.

Long after you can walk, and I can walk,
When our spirits no longer inhabit these
So-similar bodies,
The wax fruit I bought will still exist
As we know it today.