Ten Years of Poems

Dear Mother Is it too much to hope since you are 86 and I am 62 we can now accept the fact that though we live in the same family we are remarkably different If we both acknowledge that this my life you gave birth to is usually anathema to you frustrating and unmalleable won’t it be easier You can give up the training the remonstrative clucks and steely glances the raise havoc with feelings and block communication between us and we can be friends Granny set this pattern earlier assailing you with her headlong drives but I say the blind compulsion stops here and I encourage you to do the same think how restful it could be Can’t you try now to see me as a member of a different reputable society viewing you with the same scenario coping in my own peculiar manner while respecting our dissimilar styles I’ll sew for you cook for you listen to you and sympathize with you but I won’t hover around suspended like an insecure puzzled child hoping to be accepted and loved Understanding that game now I have to stand back and refuse to play don’t misunderstand and label it pique rather selfishness of a healthy kind because I need that energy More pressing things require my attention now like continuing to nourish my inborn optimism and firming up goals for my next life have you set yours With love as always, B.