Un Coeur En Hiver
Wearing a dark maternal mane
On top of Cherokee shoulders,
My mother’s Bff
And the divine mother of my years
Always looked warily down the drive
From her business window,
For the last one of us
Still yet out in the night.
Now, in uninvited requiem,
I see her slipping among my rooms
Like a lioness on prowl in grasses
Silvered eyes staring-away infrared light;
She pauses there among my pictures of her,
And I scan her remembrances--
Sleek nostrils sharpened with passion;
Strong paws that cuffed our needed backsides;
And that voice that ballooned with her brogue
--whether to teach or to protect.
Her family accepts her leaving us
And for me, in my pain of hearts,
I know she obeys the call of Time
But grodgingly I track her image
Through the fumes in my tears
As she shifts with wizened spirit
Ever beyond the distances my mind can tell.
Then like the heaving heart of winter
She heads down wind
And as she goes she uses her love for words,
Like praises in all cases,
As a lioness would,
Huffing them out fadingly with clouds of breath
Onto my chilled sunless veldt;
Announcing to other creatures of harm
--and I--
Her vow to still keep her family safe.
Dumas fils
(For Martha Jean Meeks Calhoun, my Godmother of years)