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Two
Poems
by
Emily Strauss
Mother
Would
Mother
pushes buttons in a special way:
elevators, adding
machines, crosswalk signals,
a long fierce holding for
special emphasis
like a doorbell held to show impatience
ringing half a minute through an empty house
then
released with a triumph of mastery, having
won a battle a
mere stab would never evince.
She
does the same dropping a bit of rotten
peach into the
kitchen sink, not just setting
the offending matter down
but hurling it,
a downward flick of the wrist with a
pitcher's
strength in a show of disgust— mashing
that piece of fat, lettuce shank, slice of moldy
cheese:
all get the same offended treatment.
Mother
is definite about everything—
she plants each leg,
watch out if you are a slow
beetle, mauls the door handle
when she leaves,
ties her shoes so tight they yelp, pumps
the handle
on the liquid soap fiercely, stretches that dish
cloth
until it snaps, throws the apple core into the trash
so it knows it can't come back out.
Mother
has her ways: determined, precise—
T-shirts folded
with military precision, books
ordered by size and type,
skirts organized by color,
different-shaped pastas each in
their glass bottle,
towels in thirds on the rack, magazines
like cocktail
napkins overlapping on the table, throw
pillows
at equal angles in each corner of the sofa.
Mother
can hug me fiercely or ignore me
absolutely; buy me special
blackberry tarts
or serve sliced tomatoes for dinner,
forgetting
to cook the rice, sew beautiful quilts and wear
Goodwill T-shirts, remember her hearing aids
only
after I've shouted until my throat hurts,
smiling guiltily
and rummaging in her tool drawer.
Mother
wonders why I visit once a year.
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