Sunday, October 4, 2009





Scalpel at the airport


Those stainless steel
carts stacked with
gray tubs for shoes,
belts, and other
precious things?


I hadn’t noticed their
gleaming surface
before, not till the day
I said to my last born


goodbye


That’s when 
I saw how
they resemble
operating tables,


and something carved
me open as I watched
him pass through the
security arch, disappear,
moving his life away.


Clean cut, no sutures,
left to heal with time.
So fast, no one even saw.


I bent my arm
to wave not grasp,
lifted my lips against
the gravity of sorrow


and blew him a kiss.




Image from marinabroere.blogspot.com

3 comments:

Lydia said...

This is exquisite, Kathleen! I'm not even a mother and my heart has taken a journey with this poem that made me feel as if I'd had that goodbye myself.

Jinksy said...

Brilliant!

g-man said...

Are you on 55 vacation?