I have an abundance of mothers
for now
Women born in the first part
of the last century
Who know when everything happened
though they do not always
agree on the dates
All have worn through
the soles of their shoes
One painted and two played the piano
a third was a photographer
and another wrote poems
while the fifth grew flowers in the front
tomatoes in the back
They don’t do these things anymore
Two of them revert to Greek
when they are tired
and they are tired all the time now
I can’t even recite the alphabet in Greek
but I know what they are saying
It’s time they insist
as if they had a plane to catch
but I am studying the clock’s inner works
As if the clock were the problem
and not the plane waiting at the gate
