Owen helped me film my contributions to the Earth Stanzas project. You can view them on our YouTube channel.
unexpected generosity
I keep apologetically
thanking my son
for helping me,
for spending his time
on something important to me,
and he’s just puzzled
why I should be
this grateful
Debaser in Chief
at a time this country needs
men who lay down arms
take a knee
and march with us
he stands scolding
arms folded shaking his head
then wagging his finger
just like my father
standing over my little bawling son
ordering
you –
cut that out
they never learned
the fastest way to end tears
is with with an understanding
hug
something in this breathless time
we all ache for
forgiveness
one day after I nick him with the scissors
he says next time his hair is in his eyes
I may try again
I believe in second chances he says
with all the gravity of a 9-year-old
who has come to accept adult failings
what greater gift could there be
from your own child’s lips?
baby toes
his toe hurts
on the inside
my insides recoil –
is this it then?
it’s still weeks
(if not months)
til we know
do you remember
those round baby toes
tender as sweet peas?
they’re always on the inside –
my infant sons
embedded in these now lanky
sometimes sullen
more often wise and generous souls
like reverse ancestors
ghosts of their young selves
bound to the present
shades/shadows stitched to their current forms
when they were born
the curious asked
what’s the hardest part?
being so vulnerable
(I always knew)
so many new ways to come to harm –
these beings from my body
out in the sometimes indifferent world
and I so imperfect to guard them well enough
tonight I will pray
for soft pink carefree souls
toes running barefoot tomorrow
dodging disaster
one more day
sacrifices
the very hardest part
of this hard scary spring
is not hugging
my own mom
Amma in a time of Covid
from the smallest world
of anyone I know
she sends 50-year-old postcards
from all over the globe
elegant puzzles with intricate pieces
novels about whatever’s going on
(foxes, Incas, Aborigines)
she sends a tube of sock supplies
and the needles to make them
questions and answers
and a basket going over a balcony
to keep everyone safe
most of all
she sends her love
Molly
she keeps the vacuum calendar
and the trusty stopwatch
she buys masks
for the mailman
she funds the nanny
and the housekeeper
while they stay home
she reins in Gram
and a bouncy son
when you stop by
she can’t stop giving
Kira
in her outpost
far from the other mothers of her line
she waits for sun and sand and snowmelt
braiding a story
that will become a song
May
in my binder
of delicious delights
I spy her handwriting
over and over
she’s making life sweeter
one opened oven door
at a closed-up time
feeding the children
I pile up platters of care
oodles of cuddles
vats of validation
chafing dishes of just-right challenges
ample heapings of acceptance
call them to the table
groaning under the weight
of what seems to me abundance
but only they are able
to part their lips
and allow nourishment in
only they can accept these offerings
meanwhile we all sit rigidly
waiting to see
if any fork is lifted
a striking truth re mothering boys
after 12 years of mothering boys
I still don’t quite get it
we leave for a walk and I ask them
to leave their PVC pipes behind
let’s not whack things
let’s not be violent
let’s be quiet
and look for animals
they grumble, but do it for me
and within minutes they’re clutching
big brown blocks of icy snow
smashing them against each other
after one starts crying
I try again
let’s not beat on each other
let’s just walk
and see the world
the crying one protests,
requesting more abuse,
but we continue plodding along
until they both spy a mullein
at the same time –
a ramrod-straight perfect sword –
they both fall upon it at once
after much wrestling and wresting
they strike a deal
as to who can whack with it
I still have not learned
how much they need
to feel their own bodies
through the vibrations
of something else striking them
how their muscles need to be told
where they are in space
how they need to be sure
they exist right now
with the solid reassurance
only a good thwack will give
sitting still
sitting with the pain of the world
I stroke Syd’s flipper
pat his back
listen
while the ocean pours out of him
it doesn’t matter so much
where our brokenness lies
where the blows came from
how they were dealt
we most need
to sit with each other’s pain
bear witness to
the immense hurt
we sometimes cannot even name
and recollect
the strong resilient beings we are
able to knit our fractured selves
back together
sometimes with even
more abiding bonds
if only we can remove
our breastplates first
and be vulnerable
together
adolescent boys
slowly I must remove
the stones from their eyes
how to do this with kindness and patience
not panic and shock?
one by one
I reveal the world’s wounds
trying to balance each truth
with a modicum of sunlight
trying to remain
someone they’ll speak to without squirming
trying to prepare them
for the brutality they can’t close their eyes to
trying to remind them
their choices can change our path
trying to teach them
the joy of being gentle
even in a violent world
