one last garden stop
hard to say if we’ll be back
beaches, lakes… await
Day Five, Road Trip 2015
one last garden stop
hard to say if we’ll be back
beaches, lakes… await
childhood
Day Four, Road Trip 2015
a secret rope swing
hidden behind leafy steps
splash into heaven
picture with Pappy
grandchildren nearly grown up
only photos last
the force of magic
light from cousin to cousin
summer bright as night
By Heart
a freshwater lake
found from memory; a hike
better baptism
childhood relived
through my daughters’ newfound strokes
saltlessly sweet taste
coves around corners
wind-whipped waves licking the shore
new memories made
Day Two, Road Trip 2015
sunrise wake up call
to start farmland forest view
save me from the drive
kids sleep, eat, play, grin
laugh with their pit-stop cousins
sunset goodnight view
all America
lies between the road and sun
the love for travel
Because Riona Would.
All three of my children were born in the evening. If you are a mother, you can acknowledge the significance of this. They were twenty-one months apart, so when I had my third, my oldest was just three and a half.
The first two spent their first night in and out of my arms, crying because of a reaction to the pain medication I’d taken during labor or because she was THAT starving.
But Riona?
I barely heard a sound from her… for EVER.
She lay next to me in the bed for all of that first night. She murmured a little, nursed a little, and settled back into sleep, happy to be near me.
And so it began. The ending of my motherhood with the child who came into the world as peaceful as a lamb.
And that is why I am crying now. Because you didn’t take a moment to see her. To listen to her soft calls, to her murmurs in the night. Because you thought an eight-almost-nine-year-old’s protests meant nothing.
What you. DON’T UNDERSTAND. Is that SHE never protests. She gives in. She listens to her older sisters’ whims and plays along, whether she really wants to or not. She fits into the jealous eye of her eldest sister, who often teases her because “no one can ever be as nice as Riona.” She is just like her father, same birth sign and all: born with a pure heart, giving, generous, willing to sacrifice all for the love of those around her.
Riona is the one who, back in March, cried herself to sleep because I told her we couldn’t afford camp this year. Riona is the reason I have sacrificed four weeks of my summer for summer school and home visits and Spanish class, all in the futile hope that I could pay for that one week of camp for all three girls.
So. NO. I do NOT want to hear that you “lost” her paperwork, sent in the SAME envelope as my other two daughters. I don’t want to come back from 50 hours of class in 5 days to hear that my youngest daughter was told she was leaving on Tuesday, was not allowed to participate in any camp activities because of this even though she ADAMANTLY TOLD YOU SHE WAS LEAVING ON FRIDAY AND YOU NEVER CALLED US TO CHECK, was told her camp store account was EMPTY WHEN SHE HAD $16 DOLLARS LEFT AND COULD HAVE BOUGH CHAPSTICK FOR HER DRIED LIPS, or that she was just… some other eight-year-old.
Because she’s not. If you could see her, really see her, for the gentle soul that she is, you would understand why I can’t stop crying. You would understand why I have given up half of my summer for my daughters to have the experience that you have now stripped from her. You would understand that a protest from a small voice should be THE LOUDEST PROTEST YOU HAVE EVER HEARD.
But you are not a mother. You are eighteen years old and have yet to learn the reality of this kind of pain.
And that is why I forgive you. Because Riona would.
The Same Zip Code
we make home visits to welcome freshmen
who haven’t set foot in our school.
on the drive we discuss gentrification,
how these kids are coming across town
to our school because they think it’s better
(but it’s so much better than the remnants
of gangs that linger in their northwest ‘hood,
in the high school that hasn’t caught up
with the white money-chasers)
inside the first house, a blond bombshell
(shy as a country field mouse) lets us into
her gutted bungalow, replete with
granite counters all around, tells us she chooses us
because the people at our school were nicer
than the pompous competitor next to City Park
we make our way back to the south side
and step into a mansion built
on top of one of Denver’s many scrapes,
with oriental rugs leading from
hallway to music room to never-ending kitchen,
with a nice mother and a moody teenage boy
who grunts responses to questions
(because manners can’t be bought)
and then, within the same zip code of
block after block of mansions that
have all but stomped out the middle class,
we pull up to our last stop:
The Red Pine Motel,
settled along Broadway
between a bar and a pot shop.
in a tiny apartment without a table,
a man stands eating a bowl of soup,
his hand half broken and bandaged,
his pony tail tied at the nape of his neck,
his high-heeled wife potty training
her three-year-old in the adjacent room.
“you can come and look, do your check,
do what you need to do.”
we exchange glances.
do they they think we’re the cops?
are they used to this?
my colleague reassures him that this is a friendly visit,
that we have papers and t-shirts
and hope for a better tomorrow
(God save us all)
we sit on the bench-like singular piece of furniture
in the kitchen/living/dining room,
(no more than 100 square feet)
with a miniature gas stove and not a single
speck of a counter, granite or otherwise
the boy is running late
and both parents engage in disgruntled talk
when he arrives,
and they plain as day tell us what he’s like
and he plain as day answers.
they use words like imaginative.
engaging.
photographic memory.
and the little girl sports her
oversized South Future Rebel t-shirt,
and the uncle waits outside and begs
to have a t-shirt too,
so proud are they of sending their boy
on the one mile
(the one million mile)
walk between their dwelling and
the grandiose Italian architecture
that will be his high school,
where he will walk past
block after block of mansions
in the same zip code
through the disappearing middle class
into the institution
that will grant him a future
or place him right back
into the thin line of poverty
that hovers over our city.
and this is what it’s like to be a teacher
in today’s world.
January Daughters
Isabella
is it an act of defiance
once again, or a child
wanting to be a child,
dashing into the night,
rolling down the hill
until bits of dried grass
stick in your Brownie vest
like petulant pieces of glue,
causing me to shake your shoulders,
my flustered fingers unable to remove
from your almost-eight tangles
the frustration your actions bring?
or is it me, your end-of-day tired mother,
unable to remember those hills
i rolled down as a child,
petulant pieces of green grass
imprinting triangular shapes on my skin,
as i hand over your punishment
on display for your peers to mock,
only to later see the stack of cards
on my nightstand, the supplicant sticky,
“these are the thank-you cards i rote,”
your grammatically correct misspelling
tugging at the mother, the daughter,
we were both meant to be?
Mythili
with two top teeth missing,
you blend into the crowd
of second grade girls
for a weekend of camp.
you are the youngest
of twenty, demurely asking
for help with your pajamas,
with the needle you can’t quite thread,
but singing along with the songs,
joining in on the games,
snowshoeing into the woods
as if your teeth had already sprouted,
as if you had already skipped
over kinder and first grade,
my little one wanting
to be all grown up.
Riona
from the moment of birth
after twenty-four hours
of fighting to emerge,
when you made less than two peeps
and settled in next to my skin
for a peaceful night of nursing,
to the quiet child who follows
Daddy to a job and speaks not a word,
who cuddles silently on the couch
with a fever that you’ll tell no one about,
i truly believe,
my youngest, angelic child,
that you were born
without a single complaint in your soul.
What I Learned Today
One: squirrels are suicidal
dashing in front of tires in a race
that didn’t exist before
they saw me coming
Two: canals are the best
places to ride a bike along
(flat and meandering,
tree filled and peaceful)
Three: once again, fresh
homemade ice cream from
Bonnie Brae upholds its
“beautiful hill” standard.
Four: my girls are fish, in
and out of the water no
holds barred, ready for summer,
ready for anything.
Five: two hundred joggers in
Wash Park may look like a race to them,
but it’s just another Saturday in
Denver, just what my girls should see.
Six: the liquor store is also
known as the “licorice store”
because they have wine for us and
lollipops for them: a treat for all.
Seven: playing outside with
the neighbor kids is just as magical
for this generation as it was for mine,
just as free, and just the way to end the day.
My Own Middle Place
Please tell me why
when I read books like The Middle Place
I think of you and want to scream,
to relive my childhood:
I want a do-over
I don’t want the rants and raves
the banging on doors
the sharks in your eyes
swimming at me with their
hatchets of hatred
I want a mother who could cuddle
with me on the couch,
read me stories while I curl up,
thumb in mouth,
and before the sun even sets
share a moment of joy with me
not one who’s so obsessed
with the food that has to
go on the table that she
trades her smiles for sour looks
before even closing the door at work
Please tell me why I can’t have
that imaginary childhood,
why I cannot gratify my memories
with some sort of happiness
that will last beyond
the closing of this book,
a place where I am comforted,
I am safe,
a place where I know my mother
loves me,
a place where she has shed her tiger’s skin
and wrapped her arms
around my aching soul.
Every Moment
I remember nights without sleep
and cries without consolation
diaper bags and strollers a must
for even the simplest outings
now their once-wispy hair is
tied back in tight braids and
their cries are aimed at each other
with bitter words to match.
a blur it’s been, baby years gone,
relinquished first to toddlerhood
and now we’re full-on childhood
their lives zipping by me
before I can even sit on the swing
with their daddy and reminisce
the time that is happening now,
they will be all grown up.
(I will remember this when I
hold my hand to a feverish forehead,
when they pitch a fit and act their age,
when I think every moment is too much)
because every. moment. counts.
