mama

starched cotton aprons, homemade bread, Jergens lotion, bandaging wounds, laughing praying, spending strength through your cobalt-blue eyes, soft lights guiding the vehicles of your children: gentle mama ... cold metal machines swallow you up every day now, spitting you out in silence: i want to know, will you be okay? will you one day unwrap that scarf, swing your new hair in the air and prune your roses again? you lie there so sleepy so kind so peaceful, while the disease eats you up inside, like an angry little person stomping on your brain and i want to hurt him but all i can do is cry, begging Jesus to make my mama better.