Ten minutes to write. Less time to read.

I have been writing poems for forty years, mostly unpublished, although once in a while one breaks through.  None of the ones below ever did.

Parenting

If we lived close, it might have seemed more gradual

that I became, unsought, the Mother to my Mother.

As it occurred, the moment stands most clear and well-defined.

Like birth. A bond that forms forever.

Unseen but felt, our places changed that visit

and she became my child in our hello embrace.

Master Chef

With the sweetest words, refined and sifted,

You create a souffle of my heart.

Then add a smile, which makes

me rise with warmth both inside and out.

But wait.

I’m ready to emerge, when your knifing comment

comes to prick my bubbly mood.

I am half baked by praises such as yours.

Time

What I always wanted came quietly,

unexpectedly, sooner than planned.

I found it one evening, while walking and thinking,

squeezed between dinner and children’s homework

and tonight’s dishes and tomorrow’s lunches.

I wanted more time.

Not time for more dinners or children or homework.

Not for more meetings and projects to plan.

But time for myself.

Not made from leftovers or smidgens or midnights

when everything’s done.