This is generally a poetry blog, but I've been inspired to write any number of poems about my mom and inspired to write by her encouragement for many years. My mom left us in 2006 after making it almost five years following an ovarian cancer diagnosis. (She might have had better chances if the first doctor hadn't sent her home and told her to come back in 6 months if she was still having the problem she reported and the second hadn't told her she could afford to wait 6 months when the CA125 test was negative--clearly unreliable. That second doctor said, "I learned something," after my mother's seven-hour surgery.) She died February 10 and We buried her on Valentine's Day--13 years ago. My mom was one of the strongest women I know, and I'm fairly sure I have never met anyone as positive as she was. She'd always wanted to go to college, but that was deferred until she was in her 50's. She was finishing both her Bachelor's and her Master's in Texas while I was finishing my Master's at the University of Iowa. She was so interested in things, in knowing things or learning things, but she also was very interested in people. I googled her. Only her obituary shows up. She doesn't need a google presence for me to remember that she never said "no, I can't," that she loved working puzzles (most of my family did, actually), something she did quite a bit during her cancer years, and that she never met a day without a smile. This article, What It Really Means to Hold Space for Someone, resurfaced on Facebook. I know a number of people who know how to "hold space." I hope you are lucky enough to know more than one of those people. Leaving this poem here. My mother held space with her light. luminosity noun \ˌlü-mə-ˈnä-sətē\ the quality of shining or of being illustrious; of being notably or brilliantly outstanding because of dignity or achievements or actions Light Leaped in Her --for my mother When nearby factories heaved smoke-grey corkscrews into an ash-spackled sky she saw only the young girls in a schoolyard nearby fidget twirl and rustle skirts of pearl-pink crinoline their cheeks heat-tinged their palms clasped one to the next. All darkness acquiesced. She heard only the music of girl-toes in patent leather. Inhaled their splash of pink. She smelled incense of flowering plum long before the petals peeled back drank in spring’s avalanche of white magnolia. I can testify her light razed dark. Even on days when my light runs cold still her light leaps. Spring never fails to rise all white heat lusty tiny shoots stud the snow-blind earth.
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