Dark Corners

Please don’t channel your mother

She’s not wanted here

At her sister’s funeral

We didn’t like her

Dead or alive

Please don’t channel your mother

Her spirit taints all it touches

Brings us down

Clouds our eulogies

Shows us where we come up short

Please don’t channel your mother

She speaks truth

Says things we don’t want to hear

Her presence sheds light into our dark corners

Please don’t channel your mother

Don’t let her out

Tell her to stay quiet

We do not wish to abandon our lies

©kcasady2014

Hear Ye

Even I am relieved that the ordeal is over

That she finally died

The process so magnified that it spilled over everywhere

Young great grandchildren sang songs to her

Picnicking at her bedside

Adult grandchildren held vigil

Snuggling close

Freeing the even older adult children for a breather

All eulogized

Hear ye

Hear ye

We did all these things for her

Hear ye

Hear ye

She spent her last two weeks in a morphine induced coma

Freed from cancer pain

Perhaps freed from loving attention

My mother died in an ambulance with the attendant praying for her

She didn’t die alone

Jews are not supposed to die alone

My cousin said her newly dead mother had the best life of all her sisters

You might be right I say back

Your mother had all the trimmings

Adoring grandchildren and great grandchildren

A full life of estimable acts

My mother

A brilliant independent soul

Is buried alone 

Not near her husband or her parents

But serenely surrounded by other dead Jews

So she can kibitz without strings attached

Perfect I say to my cousin

Just perfect

©kcasady2014

Resilience

This dying aunt

This last connection to her mother

Bound up together 

Tied by a complicated twisted chord

This dying aunt whom everyone loved

Her grandchildren

Her great grandchildren

Perhaps even her children

This dying aunt who most unlovingly loved her

Upon whom her mother heaped human tribute

Stripping the golden soul of her daughter

And burning it to appease her baby sister

This dying aunt cloaked in feigned martyrdom

For always doing the right thing

Smugly watched the sacrifice 

Convincing her latent admirers that the sky was red

But the sky fought back hard

With its drenching blue eyes

Though sometimes

Thunderous deep grey green 

Crying out its painful yellow tears 

Breathing blue again

This dying aunt

Old

Wrinkled 

Frail

Now unaware

But perhaps dreaming of

A red sky infused with blue

©kcasady2014

Coming Up Short

And she’s not dead yet

At least not as far as she knew

Someone would call her she hoped

She had not been to see her dying aunt

Never could find the time

Always easy to come up with an excuse

And then she'd think

Pay a visit

Do it out of respect for your dead mother

Do it as her proxy in this life

Maybe

But perhaps not

She’d spoken to her cousin

Should I visit her she’d asked

No point he said

She’s not aware of her surroundings

No point indeed

She hadn’t seen her in a year

Not since the last family funeral

Her aunt sat next to her holding a glass of wine

Supping on secrets and confessions she'd said

Your mother was never as happy as she was when she brought you home

Spilling a bit of claret with her words

Of course she’d thought

Why not

Tis the job of an adopted child to make her new mother happy

At all times

Never wavering

Because to do otherwise might have dire consequences

Still she knew she'd be terribly sad when her aunt died

Not out of love

Not out of loss

But because a touch point with the past will have disappeared

A reach back in time vanished

A voice of family history gone

She’d never asked her aunt about her adoption

Her answer could never be trusted

Too many filters

Too much baggage

Among her cousins she was the only blond with tiny breasts

Not a balabusta like the rest of the Jewish women of her family

An outsider then

Welcomed 

Judged

Compared

Usually coming up short

Of course she’d attend the funeral

And the gathering afterwards

Putting her head together with her cousins

Talking about this and that

Remembering

Chatting up her aunt

But a visit…

©kcasady2014