poem on Mother's day

the mothers on the altar for a blessing
the blessing shoots out of our
right hands and
the mothers laugh my mother
among them and I
somehow cheering her on

she rides home with flowers
in her lap they are yellow

"he was laughing
and they were being silly"

she says
spying on the neighbors
making wild assumptions about
her obese friend or
the prom date in the
flapper dress
(how cold she must have been!)
Mom my
mother dreaming
up her next post-it note
dreaming about her
father
well
her worries have never been
evident i think
she loves this little house how it
hums like a machine when she's
inside it