Jess Marlo Poet Free verse

Remembering, part Two

Jasmine is at home all the time.
I still have to go to school.
Mum tells me she's proud of me because I'm still going. 
I came home one day,
She just wasn't there. 
She was in the ICU. 
Her heart was failing and someone tried to explain to me that they had to thread a line into her arorta to keep her heart pumping. 
I just didn't get it anymore. 
It all felt like it happened so fast.
I didn't say bye before she left in that ambulance. 
I was at school.
I was scared of that. 
She got out of the ICU eventually after a lot of work on her heart, and had a stem cell transplant. 
She still had 53 days of treatment scheduled when she finally said "I don't care, I just want to be home. If I die, I'll die at home." 
We picked her up and there was a man dressed like spiderman on the street, 
He was surrounded by children with their mothers and fathers.
It made me sad.


Dad was angry when mum was gone, and when she came home. 
I knew it was about her being sick, 
The treatment she wouldn't do, 
The nurses she sent away. 
Mum was strong, 
But we knew her mind and her body were tired. 
Nobody could be angry with her for that. 
Dad was mad at me, though - he told me I couldn't forgive my mother for getting sick. I almost believe him.

I was angry.
Not at mum.
I was angry at the world for trying to take my mum after it already took Grandma Moe. 
I started fights. 
Dad started hitting me more often and with more severity. 
I'd find him asleep on the living room floor or sprawled out in the hallway.
Before I had to really  work for it to get hit.
Now I had to fight with my sister and he'd punch me in the head. 


Mum was home,
And she was so weak and sick.
She was so tired. 
Still, I can remember her jumping up to chase me and see if I was OK when my dad hurt me.
I remember dad burning my face with boiling water because I wouldn't answer his question.
My mum told me how sorry she was. 
I didn't understand why she was sorry. 
I do now.

I think I'm starting to see things a little more clearly. 
I'm 22. 
My sister Rhiannon sends me a photo of my mum in the hospital. 
Her face is bleeding, 
She's cut all over,
Her glasses were clearly smashed into the bridge of her nose, 
Her eyes were black, her hands were bloody.
Mum is still smiling in that photo.

Rhiannon is giving a "thumbs up" in the background.
The curtain was pulled off the hangers I saw what we'd all covered up.
I saw what was happening to mum,
And I saw it shouldn't have happened.
And it broke my heart.

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