Time is ticking, are you still young?
Are your parents tired...
Because the sun is searching for aging souls,
and in my life time, I intend to flare my ambitions until my mother
can cool a volcano off with tears of joy
I owe you mom
You give everything, for me to have it all
How many years must I
watch your bones moan their complaints from the inside of your skin
You have been picking
up the sunsets of other universes, except your own
I watch the skip in
between each of your steps, as if the pain in your waist were a dance
…But you are tired
And you awaken,
before the birds have finished dreaming
To prepare for
another day-
Of counting an old
mans breathing
Hands, heavy from
catching his tears
That spine creaks while
you scrub the imperfections off his back
Ears, echoing his
life story like a sad cave
Your patience
flickers as his blood is cleansed weekly for dialysis.
Aside from taking
care of 3 grown children
The life of an old
man has become the supplier of your thinning back account
Mother, you have
worked enough…
But you seem to never
give up
What ocean carried
such a heavy spirit with a heart as bright as gold, to a land where those hopes
you harbored would be falling through the drain of the bathrooms you clean
every week
Tell me mother...
Tell me again the story
of your voyage
Where you dragged
your sunbathed body through a desert full of vultures and coyotes, for a child
sleeping soundly in your belly
Do you still see the
sand slipping gently down those rigid hands every time you cash in that empty
check?
Tell me again about
the factories you used to work in
Sowing sweat onto those endless hours
Just to go home and
continue weaving-
Stitching the future
of your children together
Did leaning forward
make your back stronger?
Because mother… you
do not walk straight anymore
Mother, you have
labored stars into existence
But I can see your
flare withering away…
Because all you’ve
ever done, is try to keep this solar system together
By tearing yourself
apart.