Shadows of that Sycamore

    I could remember it well, my first memory beneath that sycamore. The emerald sea rippled in tiny waves as the cool Mississippi breeze whispered across its surface, gently bending each blade toward the soil with invisible force and inviting me to feel its warmth beneath my bare feet. His arms made a circle around my waist, pulling me close against him. The corner of his mouth pulled up slightly, his white teeth glinting beneath the glaring sun. We lay back on the grassy hillside beneath the shadows of the sycamore tree. It was there that he first told me he loved me-whispering the words quietly in my ear that it could almost have been the wind whispering those long awaited words instead of him if I had not felt his warm breath across my face as he said “I love you.”
      It was there in the shadows of that sycamore, also, that he knelt on one knee and asked me to become his bride.
      There that he took me as his wife. It was beneath that sycamore that we committed our lives to each other and read each other our handwritten vows.
    It was in the shadows of that sycamore that we both wept over our baby’s fresh grave, holding each other’s hands tightly.
    It was there that he and I spent all of our beautiful days together and overcame our terrible times together.
    It was there in the shadows of that sycamore that I stand now reminiscing the old times with him and bringing him fresh flowers.
    It is there beneath that sycamore, beside my best friend and the child I was never able to raise, that I hope to rest forever. Soon.