My sister texted me and my brothers and sister before I walked. I woke later than usual, having been out late, and having been awake many middle of the night hours because Suzi was restless and woke me. So, it was a slow start to this April 24, 2018. Joanna texted how sad she was feeling. My mother died ten years ago today. Astonishing. A decade of her absence.

In honor of my mother today, here is a poem I wrote some years ago about mothers and daughters. 

Umbilicus

Your daughter is a dream in winter, alive

and unborn, rooted in your imagination,

a mystery you will never solve.

She will drink from streams of memory fed

by mothers she will know and not meet. Dreams

of your mother – her mother – her mother will rush

into the sluice and be the juice and spoil of her – her

nutrients and waste. If she is born it will be

in April. You will be more and less than a mother –

you will be a creator. You will nourish beauty

and neglect it. You will heal and do harm. You will

give all you have and never enough. You will be

an artist, a perfectionist, a failure. You will be

a tree of dreams dying in winter. She will be

a tree dreaming a daughter rooted in her imagination.

You will be a stream of memory feeding her dreams

and daughters, born and unborn. Everything you wish

her to remember and forget will rush into the sluice

and be the blood and breath of her – her nutrients

and waste. If she is born it will be

in April.

©Kelly DuMar, 2015, Published in Gravel

All photos and text ©Kelly DuMar 2018