A pile of metal lunch trays in the Zen garden, in the rain. I found them under the house earlier in the week. I have no idea how they came to be there (under the house, I mean; I know perfectly well why they're on the steps). I feel confident that my mother never intended to open a cafeteria or preschool on Wailuku Drive, or to operate a soup kitchen. So, shrouded in mystery and therefore worthy of contemplation.

I was reminded of a line in Ruth's poem "Flotsam" (in her book Crazing) the cover of which is based on a small bowl my mother made in the early 1950s: "seeing, in this dire wind, what there is to worship."