Mary’s New Era

                   “That’s life, isn’t it? Getting past the unexpected, 
                    and perhaps learning from it.”
                    —The Dowager Countess, Downton Abbey
 
Everyone got what they wanted,
Mary notes at the movie’s end when the old lady
 
Grantham is carried away between two rows
of faithful servants after dying in a feather
 
bed surrounded by velvet drapery, cut-lace
silk pillows, and family. She was smiling.
 
Onward, I could hear, although not spoken,
and while the credits roll, we follow
 
runway lights through the dark. It is easier
leaving than it had been arriving: The unknown
 
passage to Row C. Trek made early. Box of malted
milk balls yet uneaten. Anticipation felt as when
 
a phone is ringing, waiting to be answered.
We have a satisfactory ending now—a new
 
generation. And, the blank canvas of the theater
screen in this little room lingers ready for its next story. 

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