Portrait of Mother with Pot and Spoon
The reckless opossum barely registers her presence,
content to dawdle in the middle of the four-lane.
Away from traffic, she herds him, her arms raised,
her spoon a conductor’s wand extending into sky.
She thumps her pot and tells him go on, get out of here
before she turns, tightens her bathrobe’s belt
and pauses under the streetlight. She is yellow standing there,
staring after the scaly tail swishing into shadows.
I watch her through my bedroom window—
the private rescue, the moment bathed in yellow.
She still stands there as I close the curtain,
as I wonder at her tenderness.
Nellie Cox