IMOGENE’S NOTEBOOK

My Children Are Far Away and It Is Dark Today

Portugal and Spain have no power…a mother’s reflections

Photo by Mirko Fabian on Unsplash

Here, the sun is starting to disperse across the ocean before it disappears.
There, you are 4000 miles away, dark on dark and who knows why.
Here, we invite our recliners to capture strikes and balls in stadium light.
There, you are strangers to the new flat, no memory of what goes where.
No Wi-Fi to say what is wrong, no plan to know how to fix it.

The baby has the chicken pox. She’s running a fever and throwing up.
How do you count the dots without a flashlight?
How do you act as the arbiter of light, when there is none?
How do you know when it’s naptime, when it’s bedtime?
The moon and stars won’t guide chubby feet that try to claim her balance.

I remember the deep darkness with you when the storms meant business.
Jagged flashes of light robbed the brightness we were used to.
The wind circled the fragile oaks and branches clawed the windows.