In Her Diminishing World

Betsy Joseph

October 29, 2022

“Where did you go?”  I once dared to ask

my mother grown small in her diminishing world.

Her eyes were ungazing, her features a mask,

as pieces of wordless thought simply swirled.

My mother, grown small in her diminishing world,

knows not the time or the day.

Pieces of wordless thought simply swirl

and she wishes they would settle and stay.

My mother knows not the time or the day.

As musical notes flutter and fall,

she so wishes they would settle and stay,

yet they tease her and float down the hall.

As she listens to notes flutter and fall,

her eyes ungazing, her features a mask,

the notes still tease her and float down the hall.

Wiser at last, I choose not to ask.

Betsy Joseph lives in Dallas and has poems that have appeared in a number of journals and anthologies. She is the author of two poetry books published by Lamar University Literary Press: Only So Many Autumns (2019) and most recently, Relatively Speaking (2022), a collaborative collection with her brother, poet Chip Dameron. In addition, she and her husband, photographer Bruce Jordan, have produced two books, Benches and Lighthouses, which pair her haiku with his black and white photography.