In the world of my childhood Mother
was not there. The doctors said unexplainable
things rattled in her mind, so they took her
away to a hospital, an institution determined
to reconstruct the sticks and stones,
the shields and the mask.
Especially in the years of my pre-adolescent
youth, I encountered a swelling procession of
visions as to who she was: saint, sinner, special?
A tree of ideas seemed to drop all its leaves
at once, the sobbing wind stomping them
into wet earth.
When would she return? Was it her turn?
I didn’t get carried away with her consuming
collapse, not fully, it was too much a fog rising
and falling on its own accord, pulsating
to a rhythm that never made room for me.
Mother, now in a coffin, at the table of God,
rest, relax, don’t worry, monitor me and you
will discover now and then I think of you,
sufficiently, though today more than ever
you remain somewhat the stranger.
