Sacrificing
Looking through old photo boxes
I happen to trip upon
High School memories of my Mother
Resound off the walls, faded edges
Finger printed memoirs sigh between the creases
Of the emerald green sofa
Laughing, fashionable, full of vitality
Mother to me, was
A friend, a mentor, a lover, to somebody else
Seeing how she had a life, before this family
I felt the pregnant tears start to fall
Each weighing about 6 pounds or so
8 ounces, ten fingers, ten toes
Perfect forms of some sort of therapeutic
Amends for a mistake made years ago
Taking a solitary race down my face
But I never cry
I get this kind of strength from my Mom
How is it that I don’t even know who you are?
Standing in front of the sink
Washing crusty dishes and wiping off crude recollections
On windows, what is really behind,
Those beautiful slanted eyes
I see in those photos?
The All American Dreamer
A photographer
Capturing moments in a single shot
Of insight, imagining her
Tiny frame spending hours in the developing room
Crimson passion running, igniting, illuminating her face
Dripping, re-dipping negatives, cutting and pasting
To make the world just a bit more beautiful
A touch more understanding
An image to make us human
How could she sacrifice everything?
For a bundle now grown and barely appreciating
Her surrender of a perfect dream, such ambition
Why did she accept being pregnant at 18 years old
With a wide open road and an never ending horizon
Car packed, engine on blasting her favorite Madonna song
Instead she turned around and walked toward
Home, with a baby in her stomach, returning her rose colored aviator glasses
For reality tinted ones
Sacrificing one life for another
She turned around to
Work a 9 to 5 job on minimum wage,
She turned around to
come home to
Such an ungrateful child
Mother, Unaccounted for, beautiful soul
Stuns me with radiance, such sweet
Abandon, selflessness,
I want to grow up to be just like her
Copyright © Bella Cardenas | Year Posted 2007
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