LADY IN WAITING
( In memory of my mother Ita Dempsey )

carrying carefully
in my belly
your future smile

*

I was washing up after dinner and she was drying and she suddenly said that when she was pregnant with me she was longing to see my smile and who I would be. So she carried that image in her mind all through her time crafting and shaping the smile month by month. I smiled when she told me this and she laughed and said: "See what a good job I made of it!"