—GOT CARDS IN MY HANDS I HATE DEALING

 

 

 

My Mother at 17

 

This morning with the lake

Rippled like old skin 

I see you differently for once

A young woman without weaponry

A black-and-white beauty queen

Tilting your face like 

A palm toward the rays

Eager men always loitering near

The hem of your skirt 

The future still a too-far star

None of us yet blooming inside you

Just the fingers of youth and brashness

Tapping on your lips hips and brain

Like a looming question without answers 

And where it all turned

I’ll never know

But the sun’s slow to raise her shoulders

And the water’s stagnant staring back at me askance

So I’ll stay here caught in this moment

A time when you are not only young

But kind honest and forgivable