I had a realization recently, that as my mother was dying, she was grieving too. I started to wonder how I would feel if I knew I was leaving a husband, two children, and a community of people who leaned on me to all live on without me. What anguish might I feel thinking about the years I wouldn’t get to savor with them? What lessons would I fear I didn’t have the time to impart? Judy Garland and a young Liza Minnelli appear in this piece, and my connection to my mom feels a lot like their stances. An everlasting yearning that I believe we both feel. Searching for each other in opposite directions.

A spear through the knee

Won’t be a mother

She can’t run for them

I can never tell if I feel as if my mother’s blossoming was cut short, or advanced prematurely. Death and life aren’t seamless opposites and we confuse them consistently. Her spirit lives on and continues to expand— either through me or beside me. This is something I know for certain. I rush the clock, thinking that there is only this time, only this place. It’s a futile way to move, but is my instinct, the thing I am trying to unlearn.

I searched for her

In cathedrals that weren’t of my faith

Chasing stained glass like it contained a set of secrets

I know she waits in the wings

But my hands move through the fog

And catch nothing

River rocks are often smooth and round. The running water and moving sand buff them out over time. I think our personal sediments soften, too. Layers build up, layers smoothe out. We become solid in what we are as time rushes by us. The crystals you find in these rocks have not been formed there, but existed before. One could say they are inherited. In the ocean, sediment sinks to the bottom of the seafloor and compresses over time. Almost unseen. All of this means something to me. All of it teaches me about my home, my body.

Will Mother Nature still sing

After being told

That she is silly?

After being told

That she should endure?

We don’t need anyone but her

Pain and pleasure often mirror each other

The ache that characterizes my bones

Is not divorced from passionate yearning

It all burns just as bright

And the wishes that follow float like clouds

Dancing along the sea

Something dancing in my belly

Something rising from ashes

Something that is always there for you

Will always be there for you

And now that you’re gone I can still feel the scratch of your stubble

on my cheek

It tingles in remembrance

Even as the cord snaps

I pressed 11

You pressed 2

All the passion at once

More fire than my feeble body can contain

These pretty screams keep getting celebrated

I don’t know how to properly feel tired or hungry

There is only dizziness

The earth spinning into collapse

There is only unease

Brain thick with fog

And last ditch efforts at rest

She is not angry

She wears her crown

She is angry

This is healing too

I don’t want to anger but I am rage

I am doing it all

All alone

There is a quiet rage inside

That she can’t quite stomach

And she can’t quite contain

It feels like hunger

She takes a hot shower

Hoping it’s possible to wash it away

Her face is made if prickling fire

Everything that grows

Grows between the lines

I may always feel this way

A little odd

Caught between places

Transient

Gradient

Perhaps this is where

I learn to dance