“No,” she said “just no.”
I wilted,
watching her detachment
as if I was an insect crossing her plate
to be brushed aside.
Embarrassed, shutting down
where hope to share myself had sprung
but met her disdain.

But I’m your mom,
and they don’t care,
these strangers without a single string to your heart
or mine.
And yet she yanks on mine
as if my thoughts will hurt them.

What can I do
to get through to you?
It’s not my life but yours,
and someone else who loves you
that may fight
then move away.
I pray it’s not ahead for you.

I don’t have the luxury.
You demand my heart
the way you did my womb.
The hope of all our years
placed in my arms and at my breast
after sweat and tears had left my body.

My baby,
my everlasting love,
my singular weakness.
The one I could never turn away.
Dismissing a part of me with “No”
as if I need permission to be tender
and reveal myself.

Where did I go wrong?
I don’t allow this from anyone.
I walk.
But no one else has my soul by a cord,
through my heart,
taking nourishment for life
and sending back a sense of purpose.

Nothing greater in joy or pain,
than mother.
And this, I know,
is *ahead of me for life.