To My Mother
by George Barker
Most near, most dear, most loved and most far,
Under the window where I often found her
Sitting as huge as Asia, seismic with laughter,
Gin and chicken helpless in her Irish hand,
Irresistible as Rabelais, but most tender for
The lame dogs and hurt birds that surround her—
She is a procession no one can follow after
But be like a little dog following a brass band.She will not glance up at the bomber, or condescend
To drop her gin and scuttle to a cellar,
But lean on the mahogany table like a mountain
Whom only faith can move, and so I send
O all my faith, and all my love to tell her
That she will move from mourning into morning.
Source: http://reginaldshepherd.blogspot.com/2007/05/on-george-barker.html
Getting older is something you hear about long before you really believe in it. It's something your elders talk about first when they are young, and it's in jest. "Oh my aching back…getting' old, I guess."
Old is something your grandparents are, sort of. They still are really the VIP's of the family and they do dynamic things that you admire and sort of envy, like retiring and moving to Florida. My Dad's parents moved to Florida when they retired "to thin their blood." They would come back to stay in my aunt's house in summers and we enjoyed them again, just as before.
Mom's mother never did get old. She died when Mom was just a pre-teen. We knew her as a story character, a tragic figure in suspended animation in my mother's life. She was a classically beautiful woman in the black and white photos, dressed in white cotton that set off her sun-kissed complexion, luxurious dark hair piled up over her serene face. My grandfather took a lot of photos with good reason. She was gorgeous.
Years last long when you are a child, and my grandparents stayed the same for such a long time.. Then one winter my folks told me the most difficult news I'd ever had to get my mind around-- my grandfather had died. My father would be going to Florida for the funeral.
It did not seem possible. Granddad was my friend and my mentor in so many ways. He had hard candies for me next to his card table. He taught me to play checkers! He listened to the baseball games in summer with the sound turned all the way up because he was deaf. He gave me the giggles with gentle tricks and riddles. He was so playful, and very alive-- but no, he was not alive any more. It was my first encounter with the death of someone who "belonged to me."
My parents stayed about 40 in my mind almost all their lives. They stopped being 40 when my dad retired and they came across the country to live near me. Dad had aged with disease and Mother had aged with the burden of it.
A year or two later my Dad died and I grew up.
Then my mother's contemporaries across the country began to die-- she really ran out of people from her life! Her two beloved sisters died. Although Mother embraced my children and "borrowed " my friends, she seemed alone in the world-- part of a dead generation. Then my mother became seriously ill and suddenly she was gone!
I have a black and white photo my son took of me right after my mother died. I call it "The New Matriarch" because that is what I found myself to be. In the photo I look about forty, but so tired. My eyes have dark circles underneath and my face is unanimated. I sit passively by the familiar houseplants that my mother had recently tended for me.
My son still takes pictures and they tell me more than I would otherwise know about myself. I am actually looking quite a bit like my own mother did about twenty years ago. There are the family forehead wrinkles, and the unbelievable creases under the cheekbones. I must remember not to purse my lips so much!
Some family person in my generation will die in the next decade or so and my grandchildren will bump into the surprise of death. I wonder how it will change or instruct them?
For me, I love the glorious sonnet by George Barker, quoted above, as he remembers his mother.
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