CALLING MY MOTHER<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
My mother answers, tells me
\nshe is putting the phone
\nin her skirt pocket
\nso she can sit on the couch
\nin the living room,
\nput her feet up.
\nIt is evening, after all, the time
\nwhen her legs give out.<\/p>\n
After so many years in the chill
\nof her distance, I am carried
\nin the warm dark of her pocket. I ride
\nher hip, surrounded
\nby the muffle of fabric, the squeak
\nand scrape of her walker
\nacross wood floors,
\nher labor, the long journey
\nfrom kitchen to living room,
\nand finally the whoosh
\nof the couch cushions as she sits down,
\nfolds her walker.<\/p>\n
Then she lifts us both
\nout of darkness. When finally
\nshe catches her breath, she holds me
\nto her cheek. My mother gives me
\nher voice. She gives me
\nmy name.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Laurel Rust is a Washington native. She graduated in English from the UW and was fortunate to take part in Nelson Bentley’s incredible poetry classes. She is the single mother of a now grown son and lives on Orcas Island. In 1998, Brooding Heron Press of Waldron Island, WA, published a chapbook of her work, What Is Given<\/em>.<\/a>\u00a0She has self-published a number of hand bound, small edition chapbooks since then. Her work (stories, poems,<\/a> and essays) has appeared in Fine Madness, Pandora, Faire, Calyx, Spindrift, Clover, Prune Alley,<\/em> and Trivia: A Journal of Ideas.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" CALLING MY MOTHER My mother answers, tells me she is putting the phone in her skirt pocket so she can sit on the couch in the living room, put her feet up. It is evening, after all, the time … Continue reading