‘Becoming My Mother’ by Tracie Renee Amirante Padal

Becoming My Mother

—it’s not so bad, really. 
 
I remind myself to floss,    
buy shoes with arch support, 
sleep less and clean more.  
I’m never caught in the rain  
because my joints ache 
when clouds gather.  
 
When the day bruises me 
as days inevitably do, I go home 
to quiet rooms without dust.  
I tell myself, There, there. 
I put the kettle on but catch 
its silent roil before the whistle 
because peace lives there.
 
This is how I practice. This is how  
I sweep crumbs from the floor and snow  
from a headstone. This is how I will love myself 
when there is no one left 
to love me back.
          

Tracie Renee Amirante Padal is a librarian, a Publishers Weekly book reviewer, and a poet who lives and dreams in sort-of Chicago.