The Tears of Elephants

When an Elephant’s molars are worn with age, she will leave the savanna to live the rest of her days by the river where the grasses are soft. There, under the moon and stars of the African night, she will lay down among the bones of her grandmothers. Her family will visit her grave to weep and remember.

**

Caroline and Jerome had been each other’s final friend. The day before Jerome died, he shuffled into her room next door, patted her hand and gave her the baby doll his granddaughter had left behind.  He cherished that doll as a tender gift, not a forgotten toy.    

She couldn’t remember her last visitor besides Jerome. She envied the framed photos near his recliner. Jerome would shine whenever she asked about them. Families save their reminiscence for graveside instead of bedside, she understood. The doll comforted her when Jerome’s daughter collected his photos in hushed voices heard through institutional walls. No one would collect the photos of landscapes bundled in Caroline’s nightstand.

That night, she cradled the abandoned baby doll and rose from her bed.  She hobbled past the nursing home’s unattended duty station, and outside to the meadow across the quiet highway. 

Kneeling in the soft grass, she released her grasp. Her soul slipped into the ethereal night leaving her and her doll behind.  

In the length of her untethering breath, the moon, the stars and the inky black sky fell down on the grasses beside her to weep and remember.