I totally hijacked this weeks them and used it in honor of my mother's birthday this coming Monday, my Irish heritage, and new life that comes to my writing- this speaks of a color that screams so loudly to my own personal preference- shades of red.
This weeks Read Write Poetry prompt #117: create a hinge, by zachary schomburg is Volta- Part One, missive; Part Two, confession, with a few liberties of length from m'E twists, winds together up a trellis, reaching for sunshine...
PHOTO (shot this way on purpose): My mom enjoyed the fact my second job in high school as a cook, I would bring her new foods to try, things my picky father would rather, her not cook, or we could not afford. My plate above is a balance of the colors in my life, and a food she never got to try- Broccoli Rabe.
Remember Émeraude
I.
Sister and Brother think of Mama in March, her
hairdo in the 60’s- touching the sky. Elizabeth Taylor looks
black dyed raggedy towels, but Man! did she smell good
in her favorite drug store cologne, those tight waist
poofy skirts gliding across shiny hardwood floors. How
did she have the energy to keep up with him, and not
her own children. His dance hall queen with no jewels,
only invisible crown of beer bottles shards. Barely
a father present, teddy bear bribe doors slamming,
and echoes of her voice in between repetitive ramblings,
years of misery, “you kids have no idea what
really goes on”, annoying please- I still feel her anger, hair
brush whelps, bruising, tear drops on my cheeks, and years of
mental illness consuming a house, passed down from generations.
Maturity questioned her childhood; was her family ever
like her- do parents realize they are role models. Mama
lies in the bed, nursing home bible at her side, buzzing television
company, baby sister told her on a warm day in May,
my son’s seventeenth birthday, he was gone- for a moment
she smiled, even laughed, and followed her only life to the grave.
II.
I fight off the smell of baked bread, cake and pies, roast beef
laced with fear, ghosts arguing as I enter a kitchen.
While coffee smells good, but it gages me with images of thick
full pots sitting all day until 4 AM, and hard to clean scrubbing.
Grey hair defines, disguises men and maturity- my own hair
dyed, locks brought back to life, brownish red.
An emerald ring was made unintentionally before my son
was ever conceived, born years later.
Dirty, full ashtrays are sickening, poison my air as smokers
stare into the distance, mashing down the butts unaware
a prostitute had just filled a needle and began to shoot up
cocaine in the same room I sat, I looked away.
Down the road death bed dementia brought on confessions
of infidelity at bus stops; MP drunken altercations; loving
a wife; not being a good father, and never an ‘I’m sorry’ uttered
I was high on drugs the day after my daughter died, until
my parents passed. I did not attend my mother’s funeral-
this poet still hates the color green even if it symbolizes- new life.
© E Stelling, 2010
