because i can’t say no
five weekdays i work past nine
predawn morn with my girls
working mother
If You Were Me
if you were me,
tears and doubt would be so common
you’d learn to silently cry,
to wipe away moisture
while putting puzzle pieces together
with your five-year-old,
to catch that knot in your throat
before it bubbles into a balloon
of anguished sobs
if you were me,
you would be more than
an overly-confident status update
who brags about cycling down the interstate
for a late-night gas emergency,
who flippantly adds an impossible dream
to the brutal reality of all
that you must carry
on your already heavily-laden shoulders
if you were me,
you would see the reality
behind your words,
you would know how utterly small
you stand beneath decisions
that press against your soul
and tear you apart from the inside out
if you were me,
you might want to be
(just for one moment)
the safe-secure-satisfied working mom
who would never do this to her family
but then…
you wouldn’t be me.
i wouldn’t be me.
and what kind of truth
would we both face
if we met, you and i,
and we were not ourselves?
Good
just like a baby
my baby curls in to cuddle
her small body
still fits into my lap
i can’t replace the hours we’ve lost
the years we’ve lost
or fill the ache in my heart
for the good i’m trying to do
that doesn’t do me any good
but when her tears creep down?
when she won’t go for a night of fun
because she’s missed me too much,
when the weeks have flooded by
in a pile of work
that i’m so fucking good at
when i can’t just be her mother?
it is too much
and i am five again
just like her
searching for my mother’s arms
to comfort the sadness
that rests so heavily on my soul
The Big Day
i don’t want to think
of your new pink backpack,
your hand-me-down uniform,
or your first steps into kindergarten.
wasn’t it just yesterday
that we swung you in the car seat
into the hospital elevator,
calling you Mythili by mistake?
how can we move from birthday
to first day of school in one week?
it’s too much for this old mom,
this worked-through-baby-years mom.
but it will have to be.
tomorrow’s the big day,
the beginning of the endless
letting goes that you and i must face.
Cast Away
my moon was awake
full and bright
casting my stress
with hands of night
the breeze came out
shunning the heat
on the swing i sat
dangling my feet
my thoughts swirled round
a storm in my head
while my pup rested gently
under covers in bed
if only the screen
could wash away fears
make the work worthwhile
and cast away tears
Definition
it could be the Spanish-English mix
from the nanny’s mouth as we sat in the zoo,
my thoughts of the last day of summer
slipping from my hands
quicker than the tears
my baby cried to sleep with,
or the anger inside
that someone would pay another
for everything i love the most.
it could be the defriending,
his cold absence of words in my presence,
or her emphatic insistence
that eight months is enough
time with her baby
when a thousand years
would not satiate me.
it could be the story i love
coming to a bittersweet end,
or the small voices
absent from my home
on the one day when
i need them most.
but i will never be quite able
to define what haunts me.
Me
i don’t want to be here.
i’m good at this.
i’ve read enough
to share stories and articles
with my co-teachers,
have taught enough
to take over their lessons on the fly,
remember her words enough
to stand at the front and teach
while simultaneously seeing students
for who they really are,
can move through classrooms
and schedules with
hauntingly smooth ease,
can grade a stack of 150
short constructed responses
before the state test is over
and still take the time
to cry a little when i see
how poor a student’s score will be
but i cannot
i cannot
take the tears out of my four-year-old’s eyes
after the rushed-morning goodbye,
the words i cannot take back,
the days
the months
the years
i cannot take back,
the me
(the mommy me)
who i fear will never be as good
as the me
who walks down these hallways.
Cheeks
just as my students pull
like a dead weight
at the back of my brain
she looks up
her four-year-old cheeks
as smooth as innocence
and whispers,
“Mama, I wish
you didn’t have to work.”
i can’t hold them back
but she studies my family tree necklace
as the salt drips down
my thirty-two-year-old cheeks
as rough as pain
and whispers,
“I love you so much, Mama.”
and it is about all i can do
it is about all i can do
it is about all i can do
holding her
without words
her cheek against my cheek
is about all i can do.
Internal Song
i’m the one who can’t sit still
whose lazy days are always filled
with activities to keep at bay
every moment of every day
why do i work so hard, so long?
to answer my internal song
my mother’s steadfastness asks
only that i complete my tasks.
for all my life i’ll be her child
walking door to door, mile to mile
i’m the one who can’t sit still
without busy-ness, my life’s not filled.
All I Have Lost
amidst the chaos
of this day
(or any other)
i have missed a milestone
that even with pictures
i will never
be able to replicate
it is not the first
(nor the last).
it tears at
my heartstrings,
a reminder of
all i have lost
with everything
i have won.
i wait for the day
when what i’ve won
will fill the void
(the interminable
guilt-ridden void)
that encompasses
all i have lost.
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