I was sitting by my mother's hospital bed exchanging messages with a friend far away. I remembered a poem he wrote decades ago about when his mother had fallen. My friend Dave Alvin wrote this and I am counting on him not to mind my sharing it here. Interestingly enough, when I took it down from the shelf, a package of Kachina stickers fell out of the book that contains this poem.
Dave has a beautiful collection of Kachinas--outside the Heard Museum's, it is the best I have ever seen.
Also, I am reminded that he included me in the acknowledgements and now it is my turn to thank him yet again for the perfect words--not just the timeless songs, but these great poems that he concocts. Happy New Year, Dave and everyone who stops by and reads this. See you down the road.
His book is called Any Rough Times Are Now Behind You. If you don't own it, you ought to.
My Mother Fell
by Dave Alvin
My mother fell this afternoon
My mother fell
and hit her head on Grandmother's
jagged wooden table.
Strips of her flaky skin
clung to the table's sharp edge.
I let go of her.
I let go of her because
she said she was cold.
I left her standing alone
in her walker
as I went for her sweater.
But the drugs
or the chemotherapy
had taken away her coordination
and she lost her balance
in her walker
and she fell.
I let go of her.
My mother fell this afternoon
like she was a baby
taking her first steps.
The pink skin of her forehead
quickly turned purple.
A small slash of blood
dripped into her half-closed eyes.
My mother fell this afternoon
and my tears fell into her eyes
as I tried to lift her back up.
My mother fell this afternoon.
My tears with her blood.
My mother fell this afternoon.
My mother fell.