The Day After the Day of Mother Love


Your knife digs in 
to the bleat of cheese
I add to the morning bread

Soft as a prayer
revering love 
the day after the day 
of mother love

The ceramic jug 
you filled with milk
I use for water
and your name sings
on my daughter’s lips
when she sees it

The two cut glass vases
you gave me
one day before you left your home
I fill with tulips
like the ones 
I photographed for you

I gently removed those images
from the hall wall
as I packed your home
into bankers’ boxes
that are still stacked
four high and eight long
waiting

It’s nigh on nine years now
since you ascended
By the tenth I’m told
those remains too 
should be buried
or burned

Burned or turned
which is the right way
the way you’d prefer?

I ask 
as I stand 
near your name
etched in igneous rock
you snug below
The Eriskay Love Lilt
couching the back
of the granite:
soft words for our missing 

You loved deeply
cared widely
spoke freely
chose wisely 
stood tall
and still
your truth
is a truth
we may never know

We come to visit from time to time
romanticizing in all ways
the vibrant stone
               of your life

Anne Sorbie is a Calgary writer whose third book, Falling Backwards Into Mirrors, was released by Inanna Publications In October 2019. Most recently she performed, “This Is A Prayer For You,” for The Indie YYC and published a piece in YYC POP (Frontenac, July 2020) edited by Sheri-D Wilson.  photo (credit Monique de St. Croix)

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