{friends are like roses
some of them, pretty petals)
(others are the thorns

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First came the pioneer
Who’s first glance preceded
Any other aspect of hers
She thought was needed
So she came short
Of wit and strength
Which she had, but had left
And put her life at arm’s length

Next came the savant
Who’s past bore her soul
Her lion’s den rose above
And claimed her whole
She could all but escape
The temor it left
Which made the trail
That lay her to rest

Third came the loyalist
Dismissed as an outcast
Yet she found a place
Amongst the other Three fast
But it wasn’t enough
To keep up
So her way was made crawling
Fruitfully but deficiently

Last came the dreamer
Denominated rash yet elegiac
She wasn’t the cub expected
For they were frankly a fallback
Born to diligence and discipline
But turned to hiraeth and lies
She sought out the moon
The stars, the seas and the sky
She took her time to raise her flesh
And examine stories beneath
Of what could’ve been, what could be
If only she escaped the heath
That was what the Four planned to do
Yet outside came out only Two
And the One who best survived
Was the one who didn’t let her life
Deprive her of what could’ve been
Power erupting from her skin
She wrapped a hand around it’s wrist
And let go.
It took the fury of years
Blood, sweat and tears
To escape the heath
And the years left that lay beneath
If she weren’t to leave
If she were to grieve
The loss of her future history
And find defeat in victory
Then would her flame still flicker?
My doubt gets thicker
She isn’t a poet, merely a girl
Unable to find her place in that world
And as she recalled a wise woman saying
‘There’s escape in escaping’

You need to let go
So what if people judge you?
As my friend said,
you need to start living
But how
do I do that?

It will not matter
whether we tend
the green stem of her care
or lose her hand in the dark.

The eternal mother moves among us—
in friends, in kin,
in any soul who shelters another.

All who hold her spirit
become one’s mother.
I will mother myself,
I will mother a friend.

Mother-Less
is Mother still.