I am not a difficult child.
You are not a difficult mother.
But,
sometimes we have things to say
and
sometimes we say nothing at all.
This,
I suppose is where we are difficult.
Because being human is difficult.

I cannot imagine why so many years ago
you chose to have us. Not because I think
you do not love us, I know you do, but
because of the sorrow my sleep brings to you
on the Sunday mornings I sleep in. Love,
I imagine, is returning from church and
still bringing bread to those who wish not to
consume it in any meaningful sense at all,
or, if consumed, to satisfy hungers so basic
you marvel at what that converted energy
is used for. I have failed still to explain that
I pray in different and marvellous ways that
I don't think are invalid but will still hurt you
nonetheless. This is part of growing up.  

There are many dances that you and my
grandmother have surely danced that I
do not have the rhythm for, but there
are many dances that you and her and I
have that are the same, just as in the Old
Testament there are so many prayers and
blessings and cursings and legacies passed on
from one child to another to another child.
During these passing-ons there are surely
missteps
where some son is bound to step on some mother's
left foot as the rhythms change on time's dancefloor.
There are many examples of this that exist
that don't need to be said. It is all the same.
It is all different. I have pointed these things out
before. Before I finish, let me point out
that when I point out these things
after laughing it is not because
I am making fun of you, but only because
I love you enough to point out the seriousness
of everything in this world with a smile on my face.

How else could I possibly repay that great push
you gave all those years ago
to allow this poem to breathe in this form?