"What One Mother Gave," A Poetry Post

Some mother-daughter stories
aren't Hallmark quality sweet or
photo album ready.

Some mother-daughter stories
resemble dramatic paperbacks
and dystopias.

Some mothers take
annual pictures with their daughters and
give them
cotton candy pink wardrobes and
manicuring kits and
pictures of themselves in
golden lockets.

Some mothers pass down
trinkets from their mothers.

Some mothers give their daughters
fluffy house slippers and
cookie dough recipes.

But one mother raised
a nation with the
gifts she gave.

To one she gave all of her empathy
so she could be rightfully hard.

To another all of her wanderlust
so she could stand being at home.

To another all of her passion
so she could stand the darkness.

To another all of her love for the church
so she could withstand isolation.

To another all of her ability to recall the good
so she could manage the bad.

To another all of her yearning to teach
to prevent her from mothering all.

To another all of her sciences
to keep her eyes in one direction.

To another all of her drive to fight
to endure the world's coldness in peace.

And all the gifts did pollinate like
wildflowers in the world,
sometimes creating beautiful fields,
sometimes creating teams of freedom fighters,
sometimes creating centers of mercy,
sometimes creating perfect chaos,
sometimes creating sadness and suffering,
sometimes creating massive destruction,
sometimes redefining classrooms,
sometimes redefining prisons,
sometimes redefining households,
sometimes redefining cities.

Out we went to be heartbreakers and healers,
deceivers and truthtellers,
fearful and beautiful,
raging and repentant,
familial but private,
sensual but separated,
all all all of those things connected like
a network of dandelion flowers and
blown out with
one woman's wish to
expand and expand and expand.

All blown out from one hand with
a single breath of hope from
one woman willing to
let them all go and go and go.

And here she stands uncelebrated.
There are no movies made about mothers who
give all of their gifts away to
disappear into obscurity.

They don't write cards that say,
"Thanks mom for letting us dream for things that
you could not provide."

There are no popular books about lives
that writhe and shrivel under the weight
of motherhood.

Nobody's broadcasting specials about
mothers who give up their very minds
in their efforts to tell their children to
go and go and go.

But this is what one mother gave
regardless of the ending. 

She gave all
so we could all
have some.

-T. D. James-Moss