MOTHER OF MY MOTHER

When a fresh mound simmered on her head,

My heart was a thousand pieces.

Everybody’s faces a million creases

She was no more.

Now, the fresh mound is a garden, beautiful and colourful,

Just the way she would have liked.

And a million rays of memories gushing forth old wisdom.

 

The mother of my mother, a remarkable woman….

About school, would say:

Read and read, daughter of my daughter

And come riding motorcars and flying planes….

 

The mother of my mother, a remarkable woman….

Her philosophy, would be:

‘If everybody’s head is chopped off and each asked to pick randomly,

I would still pick mine.

You never know what people’s minds rummage through,

Day and night.

At least I know mine.’

 

To the lazy would ask:

‘Who disengaged your shoulder joint,

So that you are fed without lifting your hands,

So that the sun is standing while you are seated?

So that the sheep and goats are still caged at noon,

While your belly is bulging with satisfaction!

Don’t be like the swallow who cries all night;

‘When shall it dawn, so I can build myself a nest?’’

And the dawn comes and he forgets he is homeless,

until darkness covers the earth and the song is renewed with more vigour.

 

The mother of my mother, a remarkable woman….

Her massive regret, she would recall:

one time, at her pubescence,

When she could run, fly like a kite,

Arrogantly asked an old woman out of her way,

Who walked the pace of a snail.

The old woman, a little disappointed told her;

‘My daughter, this old age creeps in, like the ripening fruit overnight,

You don’t see it crossing from yonder.’

She recalls laughing her off and moving swiftly past.

Decades later, my granny too got slow and stooped.

 

About church she would ask?

‘What does your God tell you?

When you run to church leaving the cattle hungry and thirsty?

I bet he’s mad at you.

What does your God tell you?

When you whisper in the dark, leaving others out of the conversation?

What does your God tell you?

When you die strange deaths, and nobody to explain?’

 

Her god, the sun that rises and sets was her close confidant.

I heard her pray often, on the slopes of Sikirioch ….

‘Oh! Rising sun, I have never stolen nor cheated anybody of their property.

Oh! Rising sun, I have never killed anybody’s offspring both human and animal.

Oh! Rising sun, I have never treated someone unjustly.

So why did you let my child vanish like the hailstones?

So why did you give me a child, with madness lodged in her head?

Why? For every other sickness is bad but a sick mind is the worst.’

And one day, her god, the sun that rises and sets,

Answered her prayer when the long-lost child reappeared with a child,

And asked me for porridge.

I didn’t make the porridge first, I ran to tell her, her daughter was back.

 

 

About Generosity she would say:

‘Feed the strange dog, for it has no hands like you do. Poor dog’

 

These memories have pursued me for years,

Nagging me senseless….

I know she is euphoric watching us recall her memories.

‘Mother of my mother,

These memories immortalize you!’

Sr. Esther Koros OSF 

essyjeru@gmail.com 

072617979