Snapshots in Poetry

My mother was a poet. Just like Dennis, my math guy, thinks in numbers, Mom thought succinctly, in stanzas, meter, rhyme ... all the elements of poetry. Maybe that's why we were sometimes at odds--l am strictly a prose girl. While I have no regrets at her passing insofar as our relationship goes--I took her with us (including paying her way) on family vacations, honored her, showed her respect, there is a new sense of loss poking its unwanted nose into my circle of grief.

The one time in my rebellious teens when I dared contradict Mom, my face bore testament to her, as it turned out, effective discipline: the mark of the traditional Mexican discipline--the fabled chancla. It really did put a stop to such things!

As for other sources of "drama" between mother and daughter, I am glad to say that they were foreign to our relationship. I never gave voice to the hurts I nursed from her outspokenness and other traits that were foreign to my own nature. Words, once spoken, may be forgiven, but the wounds they inflict are lifelong. So I am over the moon grateful to be able to say, "No regrets." There is nothing better than to be able to say that at a loved one's passing. However, I sense a longing for something that the chasm of death has now placed beyond our reach: to have continued pouring over her poetry with her once I reached adulthood.

When I was young, we would sit at the kitchen table, Mom and I, and she would excitedly show me her most recent efforts. She would explain the meaning, the symbolism, the foreshadowing, why one word was better than another, and I would sit enraptured, in complete awe. But as I grew and life got busier, prose lover me found it easy not to seek Mom out for those poetry moments of bonding we had once enjoyed. Now I wish I had.

But all is not lost. I had told Mom that I wanted her poems when "that time came" (a polite euphemism for her dying). The time came. And now I am the proud possessor of her poems.

I miss her so much that I find that the muse of writing has failed me. I can't seem to conjure up the inspiration for a blog, or for the new book awaiting its finishing touches. So I am turning to Mom, our family poet.

Below I share two of her poems, two of her innermost thoughts. I invite you to meditate on them and bask in the wonder that all her fountains of inspiration, like the psalmist who said of Jerusalem, "All my springs are in thee" (Psalm 87:7), came directly from the Father above.

Unfortunately, Mom had a penchant for not adding titles to her work. So the titles are mine, to give a sense of what is to follow.

Time

My life is filled with time--

with seconds, minutes, hours,

Then it turns them into days

And weeks and years.

Time has filled my life

with seconds, minutes, hours,

Turned them to days and weeks

and years for me

And the Bud begun with seconds has now become

a full blown flower...

When for others time has ended--

for me, Eternity--

Why?

Sit down and let me tell you

Why my life is filled with joy

Even as the world around me

Abounds with strife and woe--

Let me tell you why my heart is calm

And today is full of peace.

While they broadcast

of calamities that don't

ever seem to cease--

Why my soul rejoices

As men's hearts are filled with fear

For as disaster spawns disaster--

My Redemption draweth near!

Amen.

Mom's time has become that full blown flower.

Even so, her time of Redemption has come.