Young Writers Society

I did not love my mother. 

People like her gave stars reason to burn

To burn and expel themselves until they could no longer ignore their emptiness.

She fed them the reassurance they needed to soften the echoes of silence in their heads.

She wove them together with silk, delicate and soft,

Brittle and fragile,

Flammable. 

I did not love my mother, but mother did love her children.

Conga lines of blues and whites, whose centers are as deathly as their coronas are lively

Planted in space, imposing and flailing, scattering their joy to those who need it most

Until one day, their limbs tire, that silent song threatens to deafen them,

And they can no longer afford their joy;

Hollow hearts offer themselves to hollow soil

And all that remains is dust, frozen jewels preserved in death.

I did not love my mother, but her children did love her.

Warmth graced pale sludge heaped upon a spindly frame of loose branches

And they were the source.

She could not summon herself, so they helped her from bed into theirs.

She could not convey herself, so they translated her joy in their faces.

She could not maintain herself, so they fed her their nutrients as often as they could.

She tried to do the same for me. I didn’t try at all.

Her children loved her, but I did not love her children.

An arrangement fit for a wedding

Fit with all the enticements and flagrant displays it could manage.

It is said there is no need above that to associate,

Hence our love of mirrors, fragile as flesh.

We can’t help but laugh at those whose reflections are refracted

By cracked lenses that present us a false replication

Of our reality.

I did not love her children, but her children loved me.

Fire is fun in passing, less in person.

They say if you stare at them, you’ll go blind.

I stayed, thus, beyond their clairvoyance -

A horrid fallacy of mine -

Mother lost her perspective in a few years regardless.

She could no longer praise the vibrance of her garden of stars,

Only reciprocate their warmth.

I still shivered in my sleep.

Her children loved me, and so did she.

She could not summon herself, yet, by Seraph’s fervor infused in my roots, I rose.

She could not convey herself, yet, by snaking sweetness seeking me in my slumber, I ran.

She could not maintain herself, yet, by some manner of merciful magic, I was renewed.

She lost her perspective, yet, her eyes met mine daily, no matter how many years passed.

My mother loved me, but I could not love her.

I disappeared into the atmosphere, to stare into that mirror we all desire so inherently.

Void matched my gaze, and so we waited, my eyes untainted by the need to avert themselves.

Around me, color died in order from smallest to tallest.

Blues and whites flashed and screamed in agony

As their emptiness swallowed their brilliant husks

And the earth took itself back.

Black on black, the Void stretched endlessly.

I did not dare blink. I did not dare open my eyes. 

The warmest yellows and reds fizzled out in a melancholy harmony

Silent majority, whose warmth could not resist the impending solidification.

They spoke their last, as did she, before returning to the tenebrous depths.

They burned and burned as much as they could, until all that remained was dust.

Curiosity alone tore apart my lids, and I sighed jaggedly. 

I could not summon myself by her side.

I could not convey the gravity suppressing my chest.

I could not maintain the Void of my expression.

I had no perspective, so she let me borrow hers.

I did not love my mother.

With each of her days, she fought against the dying lights around her.

She burned, burned until she could not afford to burn any longer.

Yet she did not fizzle, nor did her sorrows and regrets swallow her away.

Rather, I stood, grasping the insides of my palms in awe at Seraph’s heat, resounding,

Bounding from willows and loose soil, making them dance once more.

I did not love my mother, but I did not hate her.