Geraniums

Now, years later,

it’s the small things

that devastate

defiant red

geranium petals shivering

frail and stubborn

in summer wind

that shakes their pithy stalks

others balance above,

already black or wilting pink

but holding on

the way my six-year-old niece

I haven’t seen since Christmas

hefts plastic bags sagging with weight

of milk and nectarines,

strips of handles biting into

her determined fingers

as she looks up at me

and says with utmost gravity

“I lost two teeth”

frowns down her lip to reveal

the gap between

where adult tooth’s jagged line

white enamel peaks

emerge from red ridge of

tissue-cushioned bone

the way today as I swam

in water that never refuses

my body with its heart’s pain

both niece and nephew crowded

toward me sputtering laughter  

attacking with their water guns

so that

I remembered what a

good mother I once was

and how I loved it

then

when three sons

were all still mine.

So today sadness

swims inside me

so that I look on,

its depth

and weight still surprising.

But now I know there is nothing

to do

but let it

flood and swirl

unchecked

unstoppered

rising

until everything is saturated

and the levels

drop and

it drains away again.

— Catharine H. Murray, 2013