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I'm no Mother,
but I've been described as maternal. I have birthing hips, but no child has ever sprung from them. I wonder where this characterization comes from. They say if you answer you hate your Mother on the MMPI the entire test becomes invalidated. I wonder what fool ever drew up that conclusion? Certainly no one who had my Mother. I loved her and I hated her equally at times. It wasn't her, my therapist said, but her behavior. You make the distinction after this poem, I would say to that therapist. And why in the hell am I in therapy anyway? I would not have been there if it were not for my Mother. Someone has said at one time or another to many women: "You're not a woman until you've experienced childbirth." My Mother would've had a differing opinion on that. Me?? Yes, I would have a differing opinion, as well. Oh, but I've birthed other things, other passions, stories, words, in that way, my way, a Mothering way. Assuredly, I am a Madonna and a woman. My Mother was a woman, but a Madonna, that is stretching it. Maybe, I am stretching things too, for poetry's sake. Madonnas cherish the earth, all creatures, the sky and water. I have loved all of these things fiercely, including myself. I learned the earth appreciation stuff from my Mother. But I've also learned to love with forgiveness and a forgetting mind a skill I mothered within myself (and must continually relearn to practice) very slowly with other teachers, other mothers over time. I wonder if my own Mother simply pretended at this skill? I am Motherless, now. Sometimes, I've suffered as all motherless children do... who must learn the skill of self-rocking, self-soothing. I believe for my whole life that I am a human rocking chair. I am certain my Mother never rocked me, though my Father did once in a hospital ward when I was almost five. Today, I remember my Mother, flawed as she was. I'm thankful for her lessons. Ones of love, of color, creativity, music, of small things and nature. And of the one that is hardest of all... that you are lost if you do not learn to love yourself. My Mother was always lost. She was a desperate kitten crying in the rain hoping to be let in. Even so, tonight, I'm hopeful that she will whisper gently into my right ear as I dream. May this be, every night. May she feel more like a Mother, more loved than she ever understood in her entire abbreviated life. Greeting her, I will hug her with the whole of my heart. Copyright May 11, 2014 All Rights Reserved By This Author All Poetry/Stories/Prose is the legal property of this Author Meloo/Melissa A Howells site: Tilt-a-World Vote for this poem |
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