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Say what you want about my mother/ I know

her cruelty knew no bounds

neglect

never a warm hug

kind word

every year when school came/fall

I looked at the flyers of back to school clothes

Nothing

I wore rags/hand me downs

As soon as I worked she made me pay rent

and that was the message engraved into me

instead of being taught responsibility

I was taught I owed

her rent

the ground I stood on and had no rights

My father’s neglect

The patches put over his eyes

not to see

never a book

nothing

She suffered from mental illness

was selfish

Through blinds

Through stories I get glimpses

Say what you want but she is the greatest fighter

She is going now

She cobbles out a life from the women she watches on housewives shows

Their competition

My neighbor buys a wreath

My mother buys a bigger one

She tells my father when I visit

Strike up the barbeque

She buys corn

pretends it’s a party

I see she has lost weight this visit

the depression she believes there is a man coming to destroy things

and there are bugs

She constantly buys poison

I know I can’t talk to her about depression/the drugs

So I say as gently as I can

Keep your spirits up/ then you will gain back the weight

On the morning I am leaving

She dresses up in nice clothes

And a pair of coral earrings I gave her

She said she’d been skipping meals

But on the morning before I left

perhaps just as a child to show me

She piled her plate full of scrambled eggs with ketchup

And she ate.