Pass

verb

• Move or cause to move in a specified direction
• [no object, with adverbial of direction] Change from one state or condition to another
• [no object] • euphemistic , chiefly North American Die
• [with object] Go past or across; leave behind or on one side in proceeding
• Go beyond the limits of; surpass or exceed
• Tennis Hit a winning shot past (an opponent).
• [no object] (Of time) elapse; go by
• [with object] Spend or use up (a period of time)
• Come to an end
• Happen; be done or said
• [with object and usually with adverbial of direction] Transfer (something) to someone, especially by handing or bequeathing it to the next person in a series
• [no object, with adverbial] Be transferred from one person or place to another, especially by inheritance
• (In soccer, rugby, and other games) kick, hit, or throw (the ball) to another player of one’s own side
• Put (something, especially money) into circulation
• [no object] (Especially of money) circulate; be current
• [with object] (Of a candidate) be successful in (an examination, test, or course)
• Judge the performance or standard of (someone or something) to be satisfactory
• [no object] (pass as/for) Be accepted as or taken for
• [no object] Be accepted as adequate; go unremarked
• (Of a legislative or other official body) approve or put into effect (a proposal or law) by voting on it
• [no object] (Of a proposal) be approved by a legislative or other official body
• [with object] Pronounce (a judgement or judicial sentence)
• Utter (something, especially criticism)
• [no object] (pass on/upon) • archaic Adjudicate or give a judgement on
• [with object] Discharge (something, especially urine or faeces) from the body
• [no object] Forgo one’s turn in a game or an offered opportunity to do or have something
• [as exclamation] Said when one does not know the answer to a question, for example in a quiz
• [with object] (Of a company) not declare or pay (a dividend)
• Bridge Make no bid when it is one’s turn during an auction

noun

• An act or instance of moving past or through something
• An act of passing the hands over something, as in conjuring or hypnotism.
• A thrust in fencing.
• A juggling trick.
• Computing A single scan through a set of data or a program.
• A success in an examination, test, or course
• British An achievement of a university degree without honours
• A card, ticket, or permit giving authorization for the holder to enter or have access to a place, form of transport, or event
• historical (In South Africa) an identity book which black people had to carry between 1952 and 1986, used to limit the movement of black people to urban areas.
• (In soccer, rugby, and other games) an act of kicking, hitting, or throwing the ball to another player on the same side
• informal An amorous or sexual advance made to someone
• A state or situation of a specified, usually undesirable, nature
• Bridge An act of refraining from bidding during the auction.

Phrases 
pass the baton 
pass the buck 
pass one's eye over 
pass go 
pass the hat (round) 
pass one's lips 
pass muster 
pass the parcel 
pass the time of day 
pass water 

Phrasal verbs 
pass away 
pass someone by 
pass off 
pass something off 
pass someone/thing off as 
pass on 
pass out 
pass over 
pass someone over 
pass something over 
pass something up 

Origin

Middle English: from Old French passer, based on Latin passus'pace'.
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/pass?q=pass

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Spin Art was the last present she’d pass from her hands to mine before she wasn’t anywhere I could touch her any longer.  

That last Christmas, Mom-Mom spun and circled.  I was to sing in the choir on Christmas Eve but didn't get to go. We went to the hospital instead.  It was one of very few times, if not the only time, I saw Mom-Mom when she was there. 

She bought me the Spin Art toy I'd seen on the commercial. Happy children attached paper to the center of a spinning circle with walls.  Onto that spinning paper they dropped paint streams and paint tears, creating colorful, sun-burst spin paintings-- paintings where the centers bled out, stretched out, reached all the way to where the walls prevented them from going further.

My mother handed Spin Art to Mom-Mom so Mom-Mom could pass it to me. Mom-Mom, confused, started to open it instead.  When my mother took it back from her, she carefully folded the corner of the gift-wrap and re-taped the opening closed. Then she handed it to me.

I don’t remember what my brother received.  I don’t remember what my parents received.  I remember what she gave me—the Spin Art and a Snuggle Bear ornament she’d received from sending in the UPCs off of dryer sheet boxes. I remember what they bought her—a two-sided photo album for school pictures, one side for me and one side for my brother. That year’s school pictures were already there and there were, my mother told Mom-Mom, plenty of empty sleeves she could fill with pictures ‘in the years to follow.’ 

That night, when we returned home, I played with the Spin Art, dropping reds and yellows and greens and blues onto the spinning picture, smelling the sweetness of the paint, touching the warped wetness of the paper, and feeing the sink that is a wordless knowing--a blue, spun painting-- of loss.  

****

We took home saplings from school on Arbor Day.  I couldn’t plant mine at home.

Nothing grew there.  

When we went to the cemetery to visit Mom-Mom, I took the tiny tree, a tiny shovel, and some water.  Back in the row of trees, where there was a gap, I dug a small hole and planted the little evergreen.

I checked on it every time we went to visit, convincing myself it was growing.  I don’t believe it ever did.  I do not believe it ever died.  It just stayed small forever, hiding under the shadow of the larger trees, back behind the stone that said Mom-Mom in different words.

I think she was buried in a pink dress.  I remember pink because of that dress and the raspberry ginger ale. But I don’t really remember—I only truly remember the top of her head from the vantage point of the bench on the other side of the room, the bench I sat on before Aunt Jan took us to her house to get us away from the evening, the Aunt Jan who gave me raspberry ginger ale to make it all better.

At the end of the viewing, my parents picked us up at Aunt Jan’s, took us home, put us to bed, got us up, got us dressed, and we waited for the limo to take us to the funeral home on that MLK holiday Monday-- Mom-Mom's funeral delayed so we didn’t have to miss school.  

I wanted the ground at the cemetery to feel mushy—for it to give under my feet like it had when I walked to the creek behind Mom-Mom's house, under the crab able trees, winding toward a place that was mine alone.  Instead, the ground was hard—frozen-- and it hurt to walk both because of the temperature exposure to my skin and nerves and because the hardness of the ground was so impenetrable. Frozen ground did not give when I asked frozen ground to give her back to me.  

So I stood still—heard words---ash and dust--stayed as still as I could because nothing more could happen if I stood still.  Two years after my father had his heart attack, Mom-Mom now gone, nothing more could happen if I made myself invisible. Nothing more could happen if I was still enough for 'more' to pass over.

But so much more would come to pass.