The turning of her shapely body into ancient took place years before.
Alveoli straining against emphysema, when cigarettes were considered seductive.
The hole in her ankle I poked with swab and peroxide
where the bone once lay, a metal pin.
Her bedside table, a pharmacist’s revenge.
Sundays up, cooking shrimp, propped with walker by the pot
swirling lemon salt and tails
onion pepper
bags of crab boil churning in water.
Mornings I stirred before the Tang
found her staring down the drain
I’d eye her through the door and wonder
why she lifted her dress at mama’s 12th birthday
nearly burnt the house down in bed with a smoke
left mama standing outside school until it got dark waiting on a ride
and no food for supper.
Now her house smells like forgotten cooking.
She piles up strawberries for breakfast, teaches me to make eggs
homemade perfume with honeysuckle, spider lilies floating in jars
and paint-by-number in oil where you pretend you’re the original.
What Mama remembers, Ruth forgets.
And I am the child.
Clashed between mother and daughter, careful in resentments
growing strong like a root, taking hold on either side.