Mother
St. Anthony, please look around; something is lost and must be found.
She will find you. She will find you
under bedsheets at night, she will work
arrhythmias into your sleep. Your pupils
will shut out almost everything, except
her eyes; those brown beads, hoisting you
up and into her bed. Her arms will strangle
your waist or force you to cradle her head
in your lap. Her words will reach you;
will tell you stories about Jim, will explain
how you look like her Jim.
The memory of your father will fade.
Other impressions stay, a macabre bird cage;
gnarly hinges, door ajar, its tenant squawking,
flying in circles above your head, like a boomerang.
Dorothy Fryd teaches Creative Writing at Kent University and co-tutors on The Barbican Young Poets Project. Her poetry has been published in magazines such as The Rialto, BRAND Literary Magazine, South Bank Poetry Magazine, The Interpreter’s House, and Aesthetica Magazine.
(Mother recently won the Norwich Writers Circle Open Poetry Competition which I myself judged. The poem doesn’t appear on their website which is a great pity, so I thought I would feature it here….ed.)