For Mom

Rest in peace, Mom.

I did not know death was so strange
I, child-thing, fossilized forever,
Somehow I thought we’d never change
We six be as we were together.

Snapshot, golden afternoon,
Walking away as Mom films us,
Krista chasing the dog, and soon,
Heather on the tire swing, just…

No, let me see it longer, please,
The sun reflecting off the slide,
Megan’s standing by the trees
That have been felled. So much has died.

Please, a moment more, I ask,
Amber’s temper shows its face,
I beg, don’t let this be the last
Time we’re in this holy place.

We did not know how young we were,
That we’d ever be something else,
Thought her being there assured,
A promise. How we fooled ourselves.

Gods, let me remember another
Fragment on this road of time,
My dad is laughing with my mother,
Their spider web starting to climb.

Another, let me fumble, grasp,
Walking through the carnival
Pouting; even though I asked,
Mom keeps putting me in jail.

Oh, wait, one of my favorites now,
She’s twirling, playacting a mummer,
Follows the parade, God, how
Long was that eternal summer?

My other favorite, flowers in hand,
When I published my first poem.
No one can possibly understand
How much that memory feels like home.

Wait, now I’m blinded by the snow
Of every Christmas from our past,
Bright tree lights, please let me go,
I have to make these moments last.

The air turned cold, I recall now,
The afternoon turned one long night,
I didn’t understand then how…
Please, don’t make me hear them fight.

The war was long, the trench dug deep,
The infant safety gone forever.
I tried so many times to sleep,
But our threads pulled us back together.

I’m running out, I can’t make sense,
Apart, I cannot hear you speak,
Can’t know what you’d say in defense,
Time’s shooting bullets at my feet.

I tell myself that I can’t lose you,
Repeat it desperate like a prayer,
I know where dying takes us to –
Out of here, into everywhere.

Maybe I need to break, to cry,
But find I cannot even start.
For perhaps the first time in my life,
There’s no pain clouding up your heart.

At your bedside I sobbed a quote,
“Love souls, you will find them again,”
The truest words the poet wrote.
It will seem not long for you till when

We meet among the apple trees
Of Avalon, where you longed to go,
The land of youth where you’ll find ease,
And when I find you, you will know.

Though we will have cast off our shells
Garbed in the light of Mother Moon,
I will find you where you dwell,
Madre, I will see you soon.

25 November 2023