Legacy

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Gentle Childhood

 My mother stands at the kitchen sink.

She smells of bubbles, of rainbows, of hot

hot water. I pick up the puppy’s red ball

and roll it to the door of the garden.

‘Don’t…’ she begins.

In the garden I bounce as high as rain drops

catch them, trap, swallow them, skipping

with our puppy, giddily.

I hate it when my mother floats,

when she rises, dark,

above my head.

She smells of milk, and I whisper to our puppy

who’s catching more balls than I can ever throw

I whisper –I don’t want to be a big girl.

My mother stands at the kitchen table.

She smells of a fragrance drifting, disappearing.

I watch her dancing, waltzing, spinning –

reds, blues, golden hues – till she coils

blurs into a puff of air.

This poem was published in Dreich December 2022. The poem was written during one of Second Light’s zoom workshops. This one led by Hannah Lowe.

My mother’s legacy

As I was growing up I noticed that our life focused largely on my father’s career. My mother’s career stopped when I was born and her primary role seemed to  be that of home maker. She did that well, with little sign of resentment. She was an intelligent, capable woman and I wanted more for her. More recognition that she and her life, were as significant as that of my father’s. Of course, she was a woman of her time. Her life revolved round that of my father’s whom she loved, and us three children. All girls.

It wasn’t until I was older that I realised she gave us more than I gave her credit for. Not only security amidst my father’s career moves, but a desire in all three of us for a career – if we wanted. She read novels and kept abreast of current affairs. I remember one year she suggested my new year’s resolution ought to be to read The Manchester Guardian every day. It set back my interest in political life a little. I also rejected her suggestion I read Swallows and Amazons, but I did read. At our secondary school girls were not encouraged to look beyond a job to last till we married. So I’m grateful to her for her interest in my career – whatever I was doing at the time. Even when her memory was beginning to go she retained enough to ask, ‘And what chapter are you writing now?’

I think it was the American writer, Rebecca Solnit, who wrote along the lines, that feminism is a process which began long before our time. We owe the changes that have taken place in our time, to women (and men!) who lived before us. Our role is to hang on to their legacy and to develop it as best we can.

References:

Dreich   http://Dreich poetry magazine. Editor Jack Karadoc

Second Light is a group women poets aged 40 and above who are published or beginning to get published and who are serious about developing their work.  http://www.secondlight.co.uk

Hannah Lowe The Kids http://Hannah Lowe

Rebecca Solnit  Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities. It is one of my favourite books.