Where Is My Mother?

A poem.

Where is my mother?
I don’t know, but I’ve spent my life clinging to whatever will hold.
All I have is a collection of fear and her shape that I see in the mirror.
It’s a loss so deep, it’s scars I’ve been too blind to see,
Or the dark shadow looming over me.
Low trust, high fear, low self-esteem,
Depression, anxiety, fear of being seen.
The grief I’ve spent my whole life resisting keeps my bad habits persisting.

Where is my mother?
I found her, the person, but only in theory, not in emotion.
I made believe in my head that she meant to do better,
A victim of circumstance, mental illness, or bad weather.
But given chances, she was too proud to choose me.
Today she is calm, but what might tomorrow bring?
I’m filled with terror when I remove the guilt,
Of her coming too close to the life that I’ve built.

Where is my mother?
The one that I needed to love me, to guide me, to hold me in crisis?
She was the crisis; the fire that left me with no safe places.
My origin of pain, my original sin?
Rejecting the wound she left within.

I am the mother,
To myself and my children, I give us the love that I wasn’t given.
It’s a fight, a battle, a daily war,
That I keep fighting even when I can’t take any more.
As I choose love and growth again and again,
I forge a new path, for myself and my children.
I heal my old wounds, from my past I am free,
The mother I lost lies deep within me.

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