Her Mother’s Face
by Mindy Watson
Amidst a sere Midwestern winter night
December 1917, she’s born,
A staunch Germanic woman’s child. Bedight
In dearth and loss, she learns too young to mourn
A mother’s death. She knows a woman must
Prepare the meals, evoke good cheer, and thrust
Her bitter tears inside where no one sees.
She weds a Coast Guard vet and oversees
His household — bears three girls, subsists on grace.
And steadfast ‘til succumbing to disease,
Upon her own, she wears her mother’s face.
Unwanted infant hurtles toward the light
In 1944, her mam too worn
And poor to greet her daughter with delight.
The wealthy gent who claims the babe has sworn
To sate her whims, exchange her doubts for trust.
But Virgin-named, she’s Snake incarnate, trussed
In greed. She flaunts her swindling expertise,
Yet knows that costly baubles won’t unfreeze
Her heart, or fill an absent mother’s space.
And void, despite full coffers overseas,
Upon her own, she wears her mother’s face.
She’s born in 1945, clasped tight
Within her mother’s arms. And ne’er forlorn,
This nurtured daughter dreams she’ll wed a knight
Who’ll grant her nuptial bliss, and — fast foresworn
To loyalty — a doe-eyed child who’ll just
Love her. When falseness renders faith to dust
And pregnant prayers produce no guarantees,
She nonetheless adheres to memories
Of Mother’s happy tales. She weighs her case,
Then smiling, phones adoption agencies.
Upon her own, she wears her mother’s face.
From birth, a target of her small town’s spite,
She sprints through cornfields, fleeing bullies’ scorn,
Hurled stones, and taunts of “freak”! Wisconsinite
In ragtag 1980s garb, she’s borne
Her share of tyranny. Her heart’s robust
Enough to weather gibes, but grief’s the gust
She can’t withstand. At forty-one, she frees
Herself and downs the sleeping pills that squeeze
Her breath away. Her mother deems her base
Look odd, but with some rouge — an eyebrow tweeze —
Upon her own, she wears her mother’s face.
Abandoned infant left upon a white
Korean orphanage’s stoop, she’s shorn
Of roots upon her trans-Pacific flight
To Heartland serendipity. She’s torn
Between identities, but must adjust:
Refute all claims of foreignness. Nonplussed,
Her heart aligns to these: Wisconsin cheese
And apple pie. She’d always deemed “Chinese”
A slight, but now she sees each buried trace
Of her within her children’s eyes. And pleased,
Upon her own, she wears her mother’s face.
A steadfast matron, serpent quick to tease,
She’s part Korean, one-eighth Japanese,
Idealist, rebel geek without a place —
My post-millennial, she’s all of these.
Upon her own, she wears her mother’s face.
Copyright © 2018 by Mindy Watson.