This Tree is Bent Too Low

A long and winding road…

 

I see an old woman

in the mirror

and think of the troubled years

I spent mothering children

who keep the fires of blame

fanned through mid life.

 

 

They will not change now.

 

 

Indifferent

or hostile, both are

still stuck in “mother hate”

endemic to a culture

that judges women

unworthy.

 

They will not change now.

 

That I did the best I could

running on empty

wasn’t good enough.

Past and present meet

an ever dimming future.

 

They will not change now.

 

All that’s left is to accept what is –

 

They will not change now.

 

 

 

Working notes:

 

Another Mother’s Day dawns – last night raccoons dug up my seeds – uprooting the dead along with tender roots. Will I bother to replant? Or will I leave hope untended?

 

I think of the young mothers who, like me, were children having children (in part) to be loved?

 

Yet how tenderly we cared for these “seeds of becoming” that grew from our bodies, in spite of mistakes and shortcomings.

 

We loved fiercely and were turned away…

 

I also think of the global slaughter of trees…