Formless
weightless
and yet heavy
burning in me like poison
but giving me life
You
your memory
your example
your face
careworm and edged with grief
and your hands
dirt stained and broken
and your voice
velvet over glass
and your words
cutting and quick
I am
yours and yet not yours
I am mine
and yet not mine
and in ways I will never understand
I belong as much to the weight of memory
as I do to the burden of the present
and you live in me
and I love you
and I give you
with open hands
my forgiveness
I stand now in the curve of God's grace
I see you with the eyes of faith
and oh God if I could go back
and love you
I would
and if I could go back and take the words from my lips
I would
but I can't
and you are
my mother
and you are
my ghost
and my haunted dream
and my wasted hopes
and the face of my brokeness
and I love you
even when I don't want to
and I remember
even when I fight it
and so burden me
with your presence
and love me
from where you are
and I give you my children
and I share them with you
and I welcome you into this life I have made
and I ask you to forgive who I was
and across these two worlds
yours of ether
mine of substance
I ask for your hand
and I ask for your love
and I ask for you to just be
mine
like you couldn't be then
and I ask you to love me
here, now
like you never could
there, then
and I offer you again my wounded heart
this daughters soul
that longs
and reaches
across this broken space and time
for you
always
Happy Birthday, where you are, mama.
