To My Mother on Beltane and May Day

To My Mother on Beltane and May Day



Your tree
blossoms late.
Always worries me,
but the buds
are finally leafing.

I remember
how you argued
with dad
and my brother
that it was a tree,
not a weed,
and how,
come the next spring,
it agreed with you
and put forth
long leaves
and curls of white flowers.

I remember
how birds
used to chupper
when you came outside
as if to greet
a family member.

When you could still sit,
when it was still warm,
you'd sit back
and close your eyes
and we'd pluck
in memory
every place you'd sat
that pleased by sounds
or smells
or seeing.

Death leaves
a hole
in soul or essence
or overbeing
that scabs over with time
but remains
stabbable
when the winds blow
from a certain place
or when someone
or something
conjures,
and the named one
hangs there
like a hint of her scent
or a blessing
in ghost numbers.

But outside
in early spring
the world,
like the scab,
bleeds beings
and drips flowers
into bloom
and small stupid things
that beckon
in their unthought play.

Your fire
surely transcends
something as menial
and undefined
as Death.
even though
the scab
burns a thousand times
for each time it bleeds.

Missing you
at this time
would be like missing spring
and having to name
a new and unwieldy season.

Not a pagan,
but I still cheer Beltane.
And May Day,
that of the workers on fire
and the pole of the dance.

You are here
with both
and yet you fly
above either.
here in the green
of first things
and the sky
over all at last.

How it finds you,
how I see and feel you
becomes nought
as you continue,
like the late blooming,
to be.

Blessings
in all beliefs
promise reunion.

I will take hope
and pretend to fly
toward you
if the day approves.