© 2014 Patricia Keough-Wilson

PATRICIA KEOUGH WILSON

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    Poems by Patricia Keough Wilson

    13

    Buying That Just Right Card for Mother's Day Across America

    Patricia J. Keough-Wilson

     

    I no longer stand in front of rows
    of Mother’s Day Greeting Cards,
    looking for the just right card
    to express what my heart knows.

    In truth, I wish I was;
    that I had a mom waiting for
    the mailman to deliver
    my gift and card to her.

    But I don’t, not any more.

    It’s a made-up holiday anyway.
    Gone big time commercial.
    Restaurants and florists count it
    as their biggest customer day.
    Adult children rush to
    make sure their mom is honored.
    Driven by love or maybe guilt,
    ready to applaud mom
    for her success,
    ignoring her failures
    on this Mom’s Day.
    Mothers are both sinners
    and saints, judged so
    by children of all ages
    and sometimes by themselves.

    Mothers fail when they
    offer a harsh voice,
    a hard tone,
    when a gentle one
    was needed.
    Mea Culpa,
    I remember repeatedly
    telling my children
    that the book
    I was reading
    was more interesting
    than they were.
    Their squabbles
    bored me.
    Their whining
    caused spine shivers.

    I remember my mother
    always listened but I
    also remember harsh words
    at times,
    words that left
    nicks in my heart
    from her sharp tongue.
    But she never held
    my hand to the hot stove,
    as one woman told me,
    her mother did for years.
    She never beat me,
    never even toed
    the line of abuse.

    We held hands when
    we watched TV together,
    even when I was a
    teenager standing
    uncertain on the
    almost adult line.

    She was certainly not
    a mom who had to
    adjust her halo on
    the way out the front door.

    But my good memories
    tip the mom measurement scales
    and her encouragement
    still warms me when I
    put fingers on keypad
    to write, to capture
    emotions, thoughts, memories.
    We shared the world of writing.
    She was both mother and friend.
    So I know the joy of standing
    before the racks of Mother’s Day cards,
    looking for the right one.

    But now as I walk by those racks,
    I wonder how my own children
    remember me as a mother.

    And I think of children who
    never had a mother
     to raise them
    for whatever reason.
    Or had a mother
    who was cold and cruel.
    I think of their pain
    as they struggle
    to buy a card
    that does not add
    to their pain.

    And I wonder about
    all the mothers
    who will not get a card,
    mothers whose children have died,
    leaving their moms tasting
    grief more intensely in this season
    called Mother’s Day.
    Or moms who failed so completely
    that their children purposely
    walk by those racks of cards
    with eyes averted and
    teeth gritted, refusing even
    one tear drop.

    Mothers’ Day is a day
    that bears both
    burden and blessing.
    Making the day
    afterwards a relief.

     

     

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