Mama in Real Time

Elizabeth N. Flores 

July 30, 2023

I unfold the paper and hand it to 

the ER doctor at Memorial Hospital.

Here is the list of my mother’s medicines.

Wait, Doctor, my brother says,

look at these pictures of our mother on my phone. 

The doctor is perplexed. I am embarrassed.

Who has time to look at my brother’s photo gallery?

Stop it, I tell my brother. 

I will not, he replies, pointing his finger at me. 

Doctor, my brother continues, now pointing his finger at Mama. 

You see a woman in her 90s, frail and scared, in pain from the stroke 

she had while drinking her coffee and reading the 

Caller-Times this morning. 

I want you to look at her three days ago, 

in her wheelchair, beaming, 

after getting her hair done,

as my niece paints her nails. 

This is Mama, my brother says, 

positioning his phone in front of the doctor’s face. 

As you examine her, please don’t forget that.

Elizabeth N. Flores, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, taught for 46 years at Del Mar College and was the college’s first Mexican American Studies Program Coordinator. Her poems have appeared in the Texas Poetry Assignment, Corpus Christi Writers 2022, an anthology edited by William Mays, and the Mays Publishing Literary Magazine.