ManicDDaily

My Mother’s Coat Easter

The salmon coat not just
a fish out of water but a stucco of the sun
the son;
I know that my redeemer liveth steepling like
the church roof, our fingers treed
in short gloves white
as sycamores;

salmon only pink in the way that a marigold
is not yellow, a kiss
lipsticked.

And, though my mother now heard how
we would stand fleshed
at the end, and where is thy sting
death,
she could not not-believe in that sharp sting, having
felt it–

so that even as the stone rolled away
and her coat leapt high
into the day,
tears steepled–

it was not a morning you could not mourn in

until, child of her flesh,
I took her by our short gloves
to swim the concrete, to roll us through
the clouds and stone, the hyacinthed
coffee,
jollying her
as if a smooth-keeled boat–

floating till blue too
would pass away, some summer night,
when bared-armed
and fireflied,
something free
would come alive,
warm darknesses
electrified,
our feet jumping
over waves of purpled grass
as if driven by pure
instinct.

I write of this
now older than my mother
as if it were only she then
who felt
such sorrow.

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A revision of a draft poem posted last year for a prompt by Izy Gruye on Real Toads, that I revised thinking of Easter and the current real toads prompt (from Shay) about a crack, a fissure.   The picture is in fact of a coat of my mother’s. 

My Mother’s Coat Easter Sunday (After Gertrude Stein)

The salmon coat was not a fish out of water but a stucco of the sun the son.

I know that my redeemer liveth steepled also as the sidewalks, refusing to take sides, isoscolesed up front, fingers not-eased into short gloves treed as white as sycamores sideways,

with fireflies to come, only this was South so lightning bugs were what would bubble soon enough as hyacinths or coffee bubbled that morning, a morning without mourning, purple, pink or even blue as new as–

Salmon an unlikely shade, only pink in the way that a marigold is not yellow, a lipsticked kiss against a cheek as wet as trumpets, as dry as the sun the son through high stained glass.

And though she knew that our redeemer liveth, and would stand at the end in a flesh that might almost be salmon-colored, she could not believe that none had died.  Even as the clouds rolled and the stone rolled and her coat leapt high as a fish above the sidewalk, my mother’s cheeks were damp.  It was not a day you could not remember in.

So that I, a child of her flesh, a child of not yet death, took her by our short gloves, to swim the concrete, to roll us through the clouds and stone, the hyacinthed coffee, and some night soon, fireflies.

Though we did not think of them just then, of how they would lighten us, of how they would electrify our warm bare darknesses.

************************************

Here’s a sort of poem for Easter, for the 4th day (I think) of this April 2015 National Poetry Month, and for the wonderful Izy Gruye’s prompt on Real Toads to write something inspired by Gertrude Stein’s Tender Buttons. 

The above is a pic of my mother’s coat. 

I have edited this a few times since posting!