A day of reprieve,

wearing a costume and getting

in a car.

A day when the light

is unhooked from its source

and no one will say why

We will just carry on as through

this distress is natural

as though it is a wave to endure

instead of a captive fall.

A day of reverie,

the last time of gathering

and playing the role

The first Christmas at her home

The first time she will sleep through

most of it.

A day that we thought would not come

with her still with us.

So we are grateful

and we take this day

putting our mourning aside

this day – a winter-solstice flower

bearing its last bloom

before the advancing frost.

Copyright © 2024 by Allison Grayhurst

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

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Read whole poem:

https://allisongrayhurst.com/my-mothers-sky/

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Exhausted like a willow tree

is exhausted after a storm

but the storm keeps thrashing

and scooping all strong things once rooted

to the ground, releasing them across

the lawn like a brick thrown to the head,

like a dream inhabited in its ghoulish

madness, running but getting nowhere.

The suffering, the need

and the love that keeps

it together but not always.

Nerves dosed in gasoline –

fire just feet away but still at bay.

Breathing for one day, taking no messages, hearing

no extreme complaints. The doors are closed.

The balcony window is open. I step out,

there is a sky and a hawk merging with the clouds.

How much more can I hold?

And then it will be over, and I will hold no more,

not her frail hand, not her scent, not her eyes

with my eyes in deep and struggling prayer,

not her body leaning into my arms,

her full weight surrendered.

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Copyright © 2024 by Allison Grayhurst

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

.

Read whole poem:

https://allisongrayhurst.com/my-mothers-sky/

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I don’t know how to sing.

My legs have become old

and there are no more believers

around me.

Clasped in a never-opening lair

with active lava and no windows,

I cannot find the cave through the narrow incline,

trapped, submerged.

I cannot sing or breathe or be here

as I am broken down

bloodied and maimed.

I cannot continue to move,

pretend the feeling light is inside me

when it isn’t, when most days

I wish it was over and the throne of my failure

would burn with myself along with it.

Chaos, eroding sickness,

and the brutal cold reign supreme.

Everything I have done

is shattered in a pit

with no way to reassemble or resume.

I don’t want to be here.

I don’t want the natural law

but only God’s mercy.

I cannot sing.

My memories are false, used-up

and dissipating.

Copyright © 2024 by Allison Grayhurst

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.

You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

.

Read whole poem:

https://allisongrayhurst.com/my-mothers-sky/

.

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