Mom

She often said seldom

Never seldom alone. Kinda

A decorated holiday tree

unlighted patches, ornaments broadly spaced

Flowerbed collapsed blooms

some late-appearing

A non-grassy sideyard, always shaded

rummaged too much too hard by kids

She never learned to drive

(and he never taught her)

Ready to go somewhere, or finished shopping

And Sunday night meals

(How did we make it on his take-home?

which he doled – after being asked)

And when she (seldom)

spoke up, it was clear, a bell

His affairs – he never let on, she let him know

And

we (all of us) never told her

his request, yet she knew

Leukemia 16 years, outlived 3 mum doctors, then

Her heart failed

worked on her sixty minutes

his decision, brought her back

wasting on a ventilator

on the clipboard

French inhale, pause, stream exhaled –

That looks kinda seldom over there. That spot

(headshake)

Don’t know why. Garden is kinda seldom this year

Making the grass kinda seldom, aren’t ya

Never futzed with that

       (so she walked until hardly)

Near done

We’re having scarce stuff

(waffles, whipped cream, canned peaches)

Eighth-grade dropout, she could add a column of

4-place numbers 8-high, in her head

Let me speak my mind here

No doubts about her street-smarts

From now on, friend husband

(Separate beds. Good-night kisses kinda seldom)

My blood has plenty. But thin, hardly.

Alot tired, phew 

on her face

why?

she wrote

no more