KATE ROGERS

My Mother’s House 

There were no roads, only open water,
or ice. She parked her car at the lodge
pulled the loaded sled home:
tinned sardines, baked beans, mushroom soup.
Bags of apples, carrots, potatoes.
Swinging her earth goddess hips,
she lifted one snowshoed foot
out of a drift, then the next.

But in winter the birches in her yard
flickered in her peripheral vision
like ghosts. One cat died, then the other.
The sun glowed on the horizon,
neither setting, nor rising.

After Mom’s knee replacement the friend,
a nurse, offered her guest room,
physio Mom refused to do.
There was no one to feed the birds.

The final summer I stayed with Mom
I bought black oil sunflower seeds,
filled the feeders and they came,
rose-breasted, gold finched and blue-jayed.
“This is my house!” Mom yelled
while I pushed the broom around,
pegged her sheets to the line
she’d strung between the trees.

Last week, my mother fell again
at the care home. Her temple darkened
like a winter sky, eye swelled
indigo as the gloaming that lingers
long after the light goes.