Archive >VOL. 20, NO. 1

Heidi Williamson

Morning

As my mother drives alone to her treatment this morning,
it rains quietly. And the rain makes me think nothing can die

when watered — then the idea of flood drowns in
and rejects the thought of a morning without death.

I can’t remember my mother in the morning
without her hair done, without her day clothes on.

I was six when she drove herself away to her new love.
Our father never drove, so from then on, each morning

we walked the mile to school, each afternoon, aching,
we walked it back again. I didn’t fear mornings then,

or that my mother would die. Though there were mornings
at the school gate, strangers sometimes thought she had.

And friends’ mothers were always kind to me,
because I didn’t seem to have my own this morning.

Even then, I knew that she must die and I would too,
yet somehow managed to forget this each morning.

Sometimes, eventually, at weekends, there were mornings
we stayed over at her new house. It was hard to imagine

her waking by her love, who was not my father, each morning.
I came to understand that the days we’d lived before were excised,

scarred over: each morning was a distance between us.
I grew to be afraid of my treatment of her, and hers of me.

This morning, as I think of her driving alone to her treatment,
her words on the phone last night frighten me: I’m scared.

I’m wary of rejecting what I know of her. I want to keep
morning on repeat, as if all this breaking and rebreaking

is a symptom of our care. I’ve always been afraid to say
that I’m afraid of her love and have been every morning

since love became rejection and moved out and on
to others’ mornings. A friend told me once, that in death

we each claim the person for ourselves. What am I claiming here,
mother, if not the sound of you that morning makes aloud?