Poem on my mother's death in February

[CleoB]

Open Season

 

My mother’s hand the last morning as I sit alone with her—

already gone though forehead still warm, petunias

 

outside the window, orange pink, bruised

as those on the narrow path once outside our house.

 

Light clings like mud to her skin,

not what it used to be, hauling off in flakes,

 

revealing fine cuts near her mouth,

“like paper,” they said as if clearing it with us

 

a technical problem that could be solved

with a maximum of red.

 

Threads of hair I brush off her face,

dark flooded eyes ignore all warnings,

 

mouth once an open smile now hollow cheeks

fashioning a skull, despite how she knew everything.

 

I cannot understand how this brain cut

can happen— where is the dividing line—

 

her childhood, the past

her adulthood, the past

 

old age, the past. Her eyes

coals over an open fire

 

warmed by what she carries within

now filling this room.