Momma

I want it to be plain--
plainer than that
pink sleeveless dress you insisted on
wearing every day last week
even though that boy in your class said it
made you look fat.

What does he know of fat?

I want it to be so simple
that when you bite into it like that
ordinary vanilla ice cream cone
we bought last Thursday at the Thrifty's down the road--
that the taste of it on your mouth sends shivers down your tiny little spine
exploding into a dance of sugar-induced happiness.

I want it to be like that.

So lets state it as fact.
There are not words to describe your place in my life
but you're so smart-you don't even try to explain.
Instead, you draw me pictures. Our dresses echoing the colors of the rainbow
our bright yellow umbrella hairs standing straight out like chinaman hats
we saw that one time in that cartoon,
your tiny hands wrapped in mine like little sausages
I could just bite off and eat
if they weren't constantly wrapped around my neck--
lopsided imperfect hearts falling all around us like rain.

One day you'll understand how
looking at you makes me want to buy a white van
and spray LOST KITTEN on the side
driving through your neighborhood with my windows rolled down
and a "free candy" melody blasting from my loudspeakers

How holding you makes me want to go back to school and be an engineer
who can design new ways to create beds that are shaped like my arms
when you finally fall asleep after insisting we read
'The Hungry Caterpillar'
three times in a row, even after we've read 'The Lorax'
four times over because evens make better sense
in my CDO world.

One day you'll understand how
loving you makes everything else so clear
--like a telescope focusing in on the reasons why
dying doesn't seem so scary anymore.
why living no longer feels pointless,
how earning a wage moves from paying the rent
to paying whatever gods may be
each day they let you run into my arms once more
when I walk through those doors at your afterschool day care.

I hope that one day you'll remember
even through all the "i hate you's"
through all the "you ruin my life's"
even when you write poems about
how deeply troubled your childhood was.
I want you to know that I tried,
that there were a lot of things you may have never gotten
but if there was anyone who ever wanted to 'get you' more it was me--
and you were never in want of love.

I need you to know that.

And I never meant to live my life as an 'I told you so'
but I pray that the day you finally look into the mirror that is your
true self and see your little girl
running through the grass so wild and free
you will know what salvation means
and it will open up a place in your heart called home
where I have always been.