You know you’re home when greeted by the sweet-singe of lingering smoke. Fire season stampedes San Diego summers, leaving you with scorching Septembers and frizzy curls. The brisk chlorine-saturated neighborhood pool beckons and Mother pioneers the sloped path with you in tow; log-rolling down fields of clover, dense like the hair inherited from Mother’s Mother. The concrete-lined pool is stained with the red syrup of a spilt Slurpee—sweet remnants of summer. Pruned fingers grasp the edge: body baptized but for your skull, all while beholding Mother basking in her bikini. Your swimsuit hides your bloated navel in the name of modesty. Body blistered with shame, disguised as self-respect. Sacrificing feminism for her father’s unfiltered faith. Emerging from the pool your toes water-color the cement, mapping a path to Mother. You catalog the furrowed brow and defeated sigh before she meets your suckling stare and softens her gaze. Hiding her pain because a daughter should never watch her mother calcify. But your eyes see too wide. Witnessing Mother is your ritual, your religion, your rubric. Bearing her testimony to sisters piled in pews of piety; their cheeks turned in complicity. Inevitability is slow when fate is dreaded. Heading home barefoot, skipping so the sidewalk can’t scorch your soles. Dirt from Mother’s garden—blooming with fertility—clings to your skin, lives under your fingernails. And scrubbing it off? As futile as rewriting history. Mother’s body was never a sacrament; it was her tithing, paid with the sacrifice of childbearing. Begging God gently that you turn out different. But, who are you becoming if not her?
▇▇▇▇▇▇ home, ▇▇▇▇ by the
sweet-singe of lingering smoke, ▇▇
▇▇▇▇ Fire season stampedes
▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇
scorching Septembers and frizzy
curls. ▇▇ Chlorine ▇▇▇▇
beckons, ▇▇▇▇ Mother
pioneers the sloped path ▇▇
▇▇▇▇ Log-rolling down
fields of clover ▇▇▇▇
like ▇▇▇▇▇▇
▇▇ your Mother’s
Mother. ▇▇▇▇
stained
with ▇▇ red
syrup. ▇▇ split ▇▇▇▇ sweet
▇▇ ants of summer. Pruned fingers grasp
baptized while beholding Mother ▇▇ in
her bikini. Swimsuit hides ▇▇ navel ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ blistered with shame ▇▇
▇▇▇▇ Sacrificing ▇▇▇▇ faith. ▇▇▇▇ Emerging ▇▇▇▇ foes ▇▇▇▇
▇▇ mapping a path to Mother. ▇▇ catalog the ▇▇ soft ▇▇ gaze. ▇▇▇▇ watch
her mother calcify. ▇▇ your eyes: ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ your ritual, your religion. ▇▇
▇▇ Inevitability is slow when fate is dreaded. ▇▇▇▇ barefoot, ▇▇ so the sidewalk can
scorch your soles. ▇▇▇▇ Mother’s ▇▇▇▇▇▇ fertility ▇▇▇▇▇▇ as futile
as rewriting history. Mother’s body ▇▇▇▇ a sacrament; ▇▇▇ her tithing ▇▇▇▇▇▇
▇▇▇▇ Begging God gently ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ who are you becoming if not her?▲
