an open note to my mother
In another world
and in another place
you might have been
worlds best mom
you may have been
full of grace
and knocked the world
flat on its face
Maybe in another time
you might have faced
the truth
And grew despite
the pain.
But in this world
and in this time,
You deny the truth
You let us down.
You let us down.
You’ve shown no courage,
It is impossible
I do not see you to hold your head up.
and as you fail
and forget that you
look down
on all those of us
you regret
You made the girl
A little girl
the other woman
in your world.
A little girl
with no power of
her own.
She had no voice
she had the right
to feel safe
at your place
she was you–
blood from your blood
and bone from your bone
She was my baby and she was me
You could have garnered
more respect
had you fought for that little whip
Instead you chose
to not trust
You built a wall
And shut us out
The ones who loved you most.
and you then blamed
we who actually paid
(And I am not talking about with money)
I have learned to pity you.
I have realized your fear
and lack of courage
Your fall from grace
without a trace
because you can’t
even vocalize the truth
you probably
can’t even face
the woman in the mirror.
It is probably impossible.
I was sorry for a
long, long time.
But, I am done with that
It will all be on your dime.
(And I am not talking about money)
I’ve fooled around long enough
I’ve waited patiently for you
to come around and talk.
I’m done with that.
I realize now,
you have made a choice
long, long ago
you’d rather be
bitter and angry
then to pay a small price.
You are full of fear
of the nature,
whatever the true judgment is,
and you made it worse
by avoiding what is truly right.
I pity you…
You are small
You are weak
You are frail, in every way
You are gray
You gave up the true
and real fight long ago
I am truly sad for you,
for what you lost,
for what you never truly had.
Long ago, you gave up
your true calling
your family
your truth
your true self.
It is sad to
know that
I am a seed
that sprang from
YOUR womb.
We are so different-
I have walked through
my fear
you have hidden yourself
away and blamed
the world and I
for the choices
you made.
I am sad for you.
I am sad for me,
because you never were
the mother that
I thought was meant to be
You utterly failed to
protect your child,
and then you learned not
a damn thing, then
again, you failed
protect your very own
grand. tis truly sad.
Someday, I doubt that
you’ll ever see that the
the truth of the matter is
that it was utterly
impossible for me
to ever betray you.
It is impossible to
betray a woman
who makes her seven
year old grandchild
‘the other woman’
and pretends that she
needs to protect
herself from a very small and
also a helpless child.
It is and always was IMPOSSIBLE
when it came to you…
And I was quite silly to
ever think, it could have been
any other way.
