"Transcendence" by Terri Lynn Cummings

Transcendence

Terri Lynn Cummings

  

Seasons stroll around the block

push a stroller filled with light 

and loss

I wait for the sound of a name— 

a lingering of e’s in the ear’s 

cul-de-sac

Autumn slips behind a cloud

Winter wraps a cloak of gray 

around my shoulders

The hour paces to and fro

pauses when Mother passes

from mercy to eternity

Wood smokes inside my throat

singes a presence poised on a tongue— 

only the lost, silent enough to whisper Maureen

Poet’s Notes: How harsh it is not to hear a parent’s name spoken aloud. Days, weeks, months, years pass, cruel in their silence. Five years ago, my mother drifted away. I long to hear her voice or hear her friends call her name. (But they are gone from me, too.) Memories of our sweet times together now taste bittersweet like the cocoa in Mom’s chocolate pie recipe—my favorite.

Editor’s Note:  Elegies are often a tough sell for lit mags as they tend to be too personal.  Terri’s transcends (no pun intended) the personal, creating a universal sentiment that all should be able to appreciate.  I am honored that Terri chose Songs of Eretz for this moving tribute to her mother.