Any Other Name

I’m reading a book

My Mother gave me

Before she died

She gave me a lot

Before that unbearable evening

Came to pass

Before her pulse tapped into nothing

As I held her hand

Books

Advice

Silver

Appropriately housed in a Reebok shoebox

But this book

Has sat

Ceremoniously on my shelf

Special

Because it belonged to her

But lonely

Since I have never cracked it open

These thirteen years

Until this evening

When Athena handed it to me

And said

“What does this book say Mommy?”

She likes to have me read a page or two

Out of “Mommy’s books” every now and again

So of course tonight

My empath of a daughter

Grabbed just what the Universe told her to

The past has a funny way

Of aligning itself with our present sometimes

My Mother’s book

Handed to me

By my daughter

Who happens to look

Nearly exactly like me

When I was her age

Finally shocked me

Into breaking it open

The book is about a women with children

Who finds out she has cancer

It is her memoir

Of hospitals

And diagnosis

Fear mingled with hope

And humor

The divine ridiculousness

Of just being human

I haven’t finished it

As of writing this

I don’t know how it ends

But I know

It’s only 118 pages

Significant

Since the book I have written

Wraps itself up

At about that number

A source of great shame to me actually

Since we are never satisfied

With our most precious undertakings

The author

Even writes like me

How did my Mother know I would need it

Maybe she didn’t

She knew everything

I didn’t start writing in earnest

Till she was in her last weeks

It was my only sanity

Better to bleed onto the page

Than run screaming through the streets

Although I think I did the latter

At least once

The book I wrote

Is about becoming a Mother

It chronicles the journey of my first daughter

Taking over my world

THE world

It is my own memoir

Of Joy

Erupting out of sorrow

The ridiculous

And humbling honor

Of bearing life

While I miss my Mother

I’m older now

Than then

I know people die

I know sometimes you lose

What you would most like to keep

And you have to learn

To live after that

Or else be an eternal Sissy Pants

I know the past

Can be a menacing specter

Dressed in sunlight

Bathed in tears

Singing your favorite song

And as much as we are admonished

By the internet

To “leave it behind”

To “go forward”

I also know

Life isn’t a straight line

It’s always a circle

An intricate labyrinth

An ocean of waves

All different

But of the same water

My Mother

Her life

Her death

Are always with me

Just like my daughters

In some way

Have always been mine

So as I read the book she gave

Of a story so like her own

I can almost see her

Sitting in a chair opposite

Erupting into a sardonic smile

That radiates sunlight

“You didn’t see this one coming did you kid.”

She would cross her legs

Wag her ever eager feet

Sip her coffee with cream

Just like Leroy takes it

And look at me with

The perfect mix of amusement

And adoration

I would sip my coffee

Black

Squint my eyes in mock defeat

Anyone who knows me well

Can tell you

I don’t do defeat

For very long

She knew that

Better than anyone

So she sent me this book

In the hands of Athena

To challenge me


Out my hibernation

To say

“I love you Katty. Go after the book.”

From across the waves of eternity

And even though she’s passed

I love her now

Right now

Like I love my own daughters

And in my love

She is resurrected

Her ocean is my ocean