Because her absence is now a presence
wherever you go, although it’s true she never
approved of what you live by,
knew what you’re most moved by;
because you are as capable as she
was culpable, you now consider dropping
all charges against her, notwithstanding
the decades it took to make
an impeccable case.
Who among us has not been summoned
to watch you, at seven, spiral
in terror down cellar stairs, hurrying
to heave into her arms with a fact
you couldn’t unlearn.
But she kept on ironing even while you pleaded:
Does everybody really have to die?
Whatever kept her from looking at you,
from touching you whose wingbeats
backed you harder and harder away
from her until you were trapped
against the wall-it’s time
to let it go-her shoulders rounded down
as she smoothed over surfaces, folding, closing
herself around what would not, could not fly.
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