Mother's Day

Last August, a Palestinian poet with whom I was not that familiar passed away. His name was Mahmoud Darwish. As I read some of the articles about him, I came across his poem "My Mother" and was struck by a couple of the stanzas. In honor of Mother's Day, I share them with you now:

I must be worth my life
At the hour of my death
Worth the tears of my mother.

I might become immortal
Become a God
if I touch the depths of your heart.

I know a lot gets lost in anything translated, but I still appreciate the beauty of the sentiment in this poem, especially on a day like today when I think of all that my mother has done for me, all the love that she has given me and continues to give. Happy Mother's Day, Lois.

Poetry: Lemon Moon

Okay, the day is pretty much over, but it's not midnight yet (on the west coast anyway), so, technically, I am still meeting the deadline to post this as a Sunday entry for the poetry pledge drive. (Phew!)

I'm not sure that I'm completely happy with this new one, but I have to start letting go of the need to perfect each of these poetry posts. Banging one of these out every day isn't going to produce a chapbook's worth of masterpieces and I can't feasibly spend all day on them. At best, this month-long exercise should give me an awful lot of (or a lot of awful) first drafts. I need to keep that in mind and remember, too, that revising those drafts, as I did with Friday's poem, will be fun later.

Anyway, this next poem (#5) is based on a childhood memory I have of choking on a piece of candy at the age of 4 or 5 (just after I'd been told not to run with candy in my mouth - kids). My mother became hysterical (the first time I found out the poor woman was useless in a crisis), and my father quickly scooped me up and made me vomit. It wasn't exactly the Heimlich maneuver, but (luckily!) it worked. And, needless to say, it left a lasting impression and a vivid memory.


Lemon Moon

I almost swallowed the moon
Once. I was running, my mouth
Full of citrus slickness.

When the story is told
Now, They talk about how,
In a moment, everything turned

Like the tide. It slid back
Too far on my tongue. Mute
And fish-eyed, I gasped,

Helpless. My mother
Orbited me screaming
And screaming like a lunatic.

My father threw me
Over one arm - a blue rag
Doll dangling.

A couple solid jerks and I
Saw stars. Gleaming yellow,
The disc was launched free.

My mother plucked it up,
Holding it high - the proof,
Her relief. The sweetness was

Still in my mouth - my first taste
Of mortality, soon forgotten,
But only by me.

To read other poems or poetry-related posts on this blog, click here.

Poetry: Cleaning Money

It's only day 4 of this poetry pledge drive and I already feel like it's been a month . . . .This is going to be tough. At least with my usual blogging, I almost always take the weekend off. With this challenge, there's no reprieve until MAY! But enough bellyaching - I brought this on myself and I am enjoying it.

As with yesterday's poem, today's poem came from something old. This time it wasn't anything resembling a poem though, so I don't have an original to share with you. There were just ideas, snippets of possible lines scribbled on a loose piece of 3-hole-punched lined paper. Now, they're this . . .


Cleaning Money

Mom cleaned everything, tops
To bottoms, insides and outs, even
For other people, for money. She cleaned, even
When everything already shone shiny like

A new dime.

My brother was always taking
Something or other prescribed
Or illegal - once it was money
From my piggy bank. In his room,

He thought he was sly,
But he wasn't able to cover
The smoking up with incense
Or his wallet. Mom tried
Scrubbing the yellowed wallpaper
Until it was clear

We were all going
To have to chip in
To strip it down, like large patches
Of dead skin when he left.

Later, he'd call
Collect, on mom's dime,
Asking for some of her cleaning
Money. Nothing she could do
But clean the world
Around him.

To read other poems or poetry-related posts on this blog, click here.