I, Claudia

(A Spoon River Poem) You loved me well, you loved me long, even with joy fading from my eyes, my beauty your heart's silent song, and sorrow hidden in burnished skies. Six strapping sons feathered our nest, pride your meat, and hope your drive for peace to rest within my breast, watching our sons grow and thrive. My pride lay seated in one alone, a daughter, supping from my dish, her grace shining like a midnight sun, her presence fulfilling every wish. Death came feeding at her door, in a single day, her light was gone. I sewed to clothe her one time more in her five years, I'd always done. Each day after, I lived to mourn; you burned to melt my frozen core. Our boys also, with fibers torn, became crippled casualties of war. Why couldn't I see them clear, with such longing in their eyes; that in my grief-stricken sphere, wounded egos shrank and died. Though she and I, at last, conjoin reduced to dust and mingled here she's one of seven from my loins steeped in years of guilt and tears. Too late discerned, my own selfhood, they’ve scattered and can't be found. So undeserved, my peaceful shroud atop this hill, beneath this ground.