In my arms she was always Lolita

When I'm alone on weekends I sleep under the pearl white silk sheets in mother's bed. I did it all the time in LA, I guess it brings me back. To what I don't know.

She keeps a copy of Nabokov's "Lolita" on her slenderly elegant little rococo night stand, I go through it page by page to read her notes and see what paragraphs are underlined. I've wondered which of the characters she identifies with, once I even tried asking her but she dodged the question by returning it to me. Are you a Humbert or a Lo?

Next to the book stands that framed picture, the black and white one from Moscow's snowy Red Square. He doesn't smile, her father, my grandfather, but I don't know that he ever did. He doesn't look unhappy but there's something in his eyes, a small crack in the statuesque exterior, and if I didn't know any better I'd say it looks like fear.