I asked for nothing–for me! ”Your father in the other room,
All stirred up and starring at the walls–
When the doctor told him, he took
It bad–came to my bed and all but shook
The life right out of me. You can’t die,
Do you hear?
What’ll become of me?”
”What’ll be become of me?”
It’ll be hard, all right,when I go. He can’t even find the frying pan, you know. ”And you children–
I was a free ride for everyone, everything.
I was the first one up and the last one down
Seven days out of the week. I always took the toast that got burned. And the very smallest piece of pie.
”I look at how some of your brothers
Treat their wives now
And it makes me sick, ’cause it was me
That taught it to them. And they learned. They learned that a woman doesn’t
Even exist except to give.
Why, every single penny that I could save
Went for your clothes, or your books,
Even when it wasn’t necessary. Can’t even remember once when I took
Myself downtown to buy something beautiful–
For me. ”Except last year when I got that red dress.
I found I had twenty dollars
That wasn’t especially spoke for. I was on my way to pay it extra the washer. But somehow– I came home with this big box.
Your father really gave it to me then. ‘Where you going to wear a thing like thar to–
Some opera or something?’
I’ve never, except in the store,
Put on tha dress. ”Oh Millie– I always thought if you take
Nothing for youeself in this world
You’d have it all in the next somehow
I don’t believe that anymore.
I thnk the Lord wants us to have something–
Here–and now. ”And I’m telling you, Millie, if some miracle
Could get me off this bed, you could look
For a different mother, ’cause I would one. Oh, I passed up my turn so long ago
I would hardly know to take it.
But Id learn, Millie. I would learn!”
It hung there in the closet
Where she was dying, Mother’s red dress,
Like a gash in the row
Of dark, old clothes
She had worn away her life in. Her last words to me were these:
”Do me the honor, Millie,
Of not following in my footsteps.
Promise me that.”
I promised. She caught her breath
Then Mother took her turn
In death. ~ Carol Lynn Pearson ~
