My mother misses me.
She called,
But I wouldn’t pick up.

Something feels safer,
And everything else, better,
When I’m away.

And yet, I see her,
Head in hands; crying,
“Will he ever come home?”

But with not one picture,
If only nothing, left behind,
It’d never be real again.

Emptied, would be home,
Lost, lacked a moment captured,
The effigy, smoldering, at best.

And still, she calls,
Answered, only my ringtone,
She’d never take my name away,

She’d said, “Son,” and
I’d pray for her to stop crying,
So that I may finally start.