Bear Mommy
Pregnant and on my own
one autumn weekend, I try
to deflect a fight
between our daughter and son.
Our little girl stalks off
and crawls to her private haven
under the round dining table.
For the next few minutes
I hear her angry silence
broken only
by sounds of her pencil scrawls
and sheets of paper torn
from a spiral pad; then she emerges
and thrusts her note toward me.
Familiar with her habit
(as a left-handed child)
to reverse some letters, I read
her words that march straggling
across the page: “bear mommy,
bo you still love me I can’t de sure
I still love you I hope
you still love me.”
Smiling, and with a wave
of love, I hug her.
These days of raw winds and snowdrifts
I get the children dressed
for playgroups in sweaters, coats,
scarves, caps, mittens, galoshes;
put on my own scarf, hat, gloves,
pull on my boots, then my brown coat
whose loose folds weekly expand
with my increasing expanse,
and we all set forth into the cold autumnal air
portending winter:
brown mommy bear with her two cubs
bounding ahead.
I sometimes think now, of
Delmore Schwartz’s Heavy Bear
“in love with candy, anger and sleep”
and watch the snow begin to swirl
into the thick grey sky
while the children erupt
into yet another fight. I think
of the long winter ahead, of
snow-soaked winter clothes
lingering coughs and runny noses,
grime-streaked slush on sidewalks,
the groan and whine of tires stuck
on icy curbs, and wish I could just
lumber off
in my wide brown coat
to a dark cave
and sleep until spring, until
I can finally give birth
to yet another cub, and lick
its soft fur into shape
then pad outside to molten sun
and willowy green boughs
unfolding with buds,
while thin again at last,
I return with the baby,
and we pick up the tenuous threads
of living with children,
each other, and our selves.
…..
This poem is from the book MOLTEN ARTS AND MEMORIES by Elizabeth Shafer (Finishing Line Press), and can be found at https://finishinglinepress.com/product/molten-arts-and-memories-by-elizabeth-shafer/
Elizabeth Shafer is a writer, artist, and retired lawyer. Her chapbook, WELLSPRINGS, was published by The Finishing Line Press in 2019. She was a contributor in poetry at the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference in 2014. In her art she has worked in various media such as fresco, printmaking, pastels, and watercolor. She has focused on oil painting and, most recently, encaustics. She had a solo art exhibition at the Saugerties Public Library in 2019. As a former lawyer, she continues to serve on the Board of the Lawyers’ Committee on Nuclear Policy, and is a member of the Saugerties Conservation Advisory Commission. She lives with her husband and their dog on their sheep farm in Saugerties, New York. Social Media: Instagram @elspeth2122026
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