October

This is the season
When I think most

Of my mother
Who drank herself

Into the grave.
Others greet red leaves

With tourism
Or wistfulness—

Longfellow
For dummies

Hot soups…
But I see her

Gasping for air
Clutching a lead pillow

To the open wound
In her chest

Death’s trusting child.
“Art is the child of nature

In whom we trace the features
Of the mothers face.”

See the bare trees.