Frail Dreams

As my mother lay waiting for surgery

in hospital gown covered with heated blankets,

twilit morn gave way to dawn, rush hour traffic racing

beyond August's ragged leaves still in this pearl hour.

she looked as one already dead, laid out still,

chin tilted upward, brows & cheeks sculpted alabaster,

the babe asleep within—I dreamed of all those passing

the night awaiting day to come, imagin'd processional

in silent light, & wept in the profound beauty of death,

unseen companion always by my side, patient lover

who brings the skull's eyes into the babe's heart,

whose song is an endless float where does & fawns drink

& lift their eyes to recognize you, whose dewy footfalls

break the strong man & give him his tears, who fills

the silent woman's tongue with words: even now

my mother opens her eyes, wondering if I too am still

by her side, I dreaming of my own children, of the day

when they'll wait patiently by my side & know this song.

Starlight Call

brothers & sisters
call back & forth
frantic—

she's confused she's
got piles of dirty laundry
can't remember what she

said when said who said &
now she's lost a whole day—
uncertain what happened

between dawn
when she was following
doctor's orders

(going to breakfast)
& the starlight call
when, strangely alert, she

remembers she should
have gone to
breakfast & can't figure

what passed
between dawn &
dusk—

& now, the brain scan,
the terminal
waiting.

Death, you come

to speak to me thru your mask,

you touch me thru my mother

who now is dying, & think

to make me shudder. I see

her as a child with all those

dreams a child bears like fresh

flowers in baskets to an aged

mother, all those songs dancing,

dancing in Memory’s too-large

ears. I see the ingenue

standing at the church door,

triumphant with new husband,

their faces full of light,

& the agony of divorce,

the lost dream, the struggle

to provide for innocents

floundering in painful streams,

the aging woman emerging

alone, gripping that rage

like a wand, a chalice

with bitter dregs for all

who cross her. Death,

tho you have long sung

parting songs in my ear, I

long ago trimmed

the twisted root that would’ve

strangled me, & see now

only an old woman’s

tears, & I a sorrow child

left to bury a broken

dream, to sit quietly

by the grave of sorrows

& clean out the store-

house that others may

dream anew & let go

as they too flounder

& find their way

on the stream where desire

could break all to pieces.

fallen

scarecrow sitting up, bony fingers clutching her wetted hospital gown,

rounded shoulders, trembling legs, she seems the death mask of a former

self, round moons of her eyelids alabaster like the eyes of tomb statuary—

she trembles & shakes, startled by my presence, eyes now wide—alert.

her mouth opens, she struggles to form syllables which fade even as she

mumbles in tongues, hisses, sighs: “what did you take from my plate?”

there is no plate, only a teacup with teabag, perched above chickenflesh

legs. her eyes grow large, she now sees me, sees that I am David, not

Charlie, closes her eyes when she talks or looks away, hands grasping

the urine-stained gown. she will not look me in the eye. there is little to say,

though she is quick to ask for her walker—I think, perhaps, so she might rise

to use the bathroom. she takes my hand & looks away, but can’t get up.

the fall has made her weak, feeble, forgetful, & the nurse comes & stops

her escape. she looks at me again & is startled, closes her eyes quickly.

her breath now labors; the nurse reassures me it’s only Cheyne-Stokes.

I watch her breathing & think of her evasions: so much pain between

us, I the eldest, “beloved,” whom she once “would have smothered”

while she could, as she brought me from the hospital. how does one

reach through a veil, through a death mask, through the blind eyes

of a lifetime & somehow find the ghosts, the love that must have lived

once? at last, leaving, alone, I drive to my next station, dreaming

how we usher out those we love whose love has always had conditions.

I am the sorrow child again, lost in a wide sky where tears cannot show

what the heart cannot fathom, where the heart must indeed be.

frail dreams

half in the dark, my mother & I await the meeting

that’ll turn her to her next dream, assisted living or

warehoused nursing. she is frail, lucid even in illusions,

now singing/talking French songs she’d played on piano,

now recalling voices already lost in her recent past,

her skin still alabaster fair, eyes bright, unsteady

even in her wheelchair as the nurse wheels her

to the conference. the therapist is gentle, yet as

mother hears at last that she will not return to her

former room, that she must turn to the next phase,

she looks down, her mouth open, then blankly up at

me, at Charlie tapping notes on his laptop: we

see the other side: the phantom doctor calling

at 3 a.m. with advice to take gingkoba, emails she

sends on a computer she gave away 6 months before.

therapists and nurses smile slightly; she cannot

walk nor dress herself, is sometimes lost in vague

time. would she like to see a private room in nursing?

the black bees

quick banter swells from mouth to mouth

& she cannot keep up—her eyes move

across her now-grown children’s faces,

questioning. frail, she does not speak.

gaunt wrists rest near unfinished ice cream,

sunlight in chiaroscuro thru the window.

pleased that they’re here, she cannot follow.

later, under the courtyard’s rickety pergola,

she is solitary in her wheelchair, oblivious to

conversations continuing around her, her eyes

above, where black bees move from vine to vine,

busily engaged, the white clouds passing

slowly beyond them. she follows the bees

with her eyes, her head tilting and turning

as they move. I, the eldest, see all, but

do not intrude. for today, this is enough.