Update #3: Clearing the Plate

 

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I’m waking every hour in my mother’s house,
where I usually sleep soundly.  Why?  And why
am I here?  There is no reason. Instinct drew me,
and I’m alert should a reason emerge, as if instinct
was premonition.  There is the birthday, of course.
 
Mom turns ninety nine this week.  She’s
a working artist.  She says she’s got to clear
her plate, meaning to correct mistakes she’s made. 
It must be a tiny plate—or a big plate with only a
spoonful of sorrow.  Funny how I can see it.
 
Her plate has barely anything to scrape off. 
The wounds I carried are long gone.  There are
no monsters here, only a mother and
daughter who are independent souls–not
extensions of each other.  The rest is private.
 
I have my own plate now with leftover
mouthfuls of mangled opportunities,
snubs and invulnerabilities.  It’s time
to re-examine what I’ve rejected so, like Mom,
I’ll have little left at ninety nine.
 
Our errors are mainly internal, 
causing suffering only to us each
individually—not even suffering—
but a sense of unfinished business,
a compulsion to leave ourselves free.
 
And to be able to sleep unburdened—
in peace and luxurious rest without
subliminal problem solving.   The work
will be done.  The work is done, and these are
the harvest years, a nurturing moveable feast.

 My blog poems are rough drafts.

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© 2023 Susan L. Chast