Silly Rhyme for Rick on Father's Day

Thank you for joining
your Ys to my Xes and
making me mother
to the more boysterous
of the sexes

Why I Love my Mom

She’s the one who loves
to watch my forty-one-year-
old freckled face sleep

Perhaps

Perhaps it is just
A remembering
Of our birth
The warmth of dark waters
Their tides pushing out and drawing back
And then the breach
The departure
The severing
From what tethered us
To the womb
Or to the earth

Perhaps the folly
Is the focus
On the when
The chronic need for timepieces
The turning back and forth of anxious pages
The distraction
The cleaving
To the notion that
Death comes later
And birth was then

Readwritepoem prompt 116 gave us this compelling image by h. koppdelaney to work with.

Happy Birthday, Mom

I’ve known I wanted to be
A mommy
Since before I was three
And it’s because of you.

I wanted to be for my dolls—
And later my boys—
What you were for me.

And I thank you
For putting so much
Of yourself
Into me
And for making it look easy.

But most of all
I thank you
For letting
My late-thirties me
Fall apart
In your arms
Over the phone

And for refusing to allow
Me to measure myself
Against the mommy
I thought you were
When I was three

And insisting I see myself
The way you say
You have always, always
Seen me: as a miracle
And to love
Myself at least that much

Because that’s how mommies love.
And that’s how mommies see.

150 posts!

Hello to all of my blog friends! I'm sorry I haven't been too chatty and responsive to your comments lately. I've been busy, busy, busy starting a new semester. Please know that I am grateful to all of you who stop by to read my poetry posts--friends, family, bloggers, readwritepoem-ers--your visits let me know that I am not just sending poetry out into the void!

My last post, "Flame Throwing," was my 150th post. I certainly could not imagine producing 150 posts when I started this little adventure. So thank you for your interest and inspiration!