Mother Love

Betsy Joseph

June 30, 2024

This rainy Mother’s Day morning

I read of an orca mom

who carried her recently dead calf

over a thousand ocean miles.

For seventeen days her black-on-white body

persevered in cold, deep waters

because she was not ready to let go.

Not ready.  Not able.

No matter the species, no matter the times,

most mothers share a primal resistance

to a severed connection with their young,

be they living or not.

Betsy Joseph lives in Dallas and has poems which 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.

Ode to Motherhood

Katherine Hoerth

June 2, 2024

After Pope’s “Ode to Solitude” 

Weary the woman, whose every wish and care

these days is this: a newborn baby blessed

with colic. She’s content to breathe the milky

exhale of his cries all night and day.

Whose home is filled with clutter, whose body aches,

whose clothes are stained with spit-up,

whose hair is ever-swirled into a bun,

who somehow still is smiling, drunk on love

or maybe hormones. Blest, the woman who

can absolutely never find an hour 

to herself, to shower or to sit in peace, 

as the days are ripped away from her,

and suddenly, a month, a year, have gone,

guzzled down the hungry throat of time. 

These sleepless nights, the feeding and the rocking

and delirium of joy all fade

to memories. Thus let me live, forever

needed in this world and never left

to rest in peace until he’s grown, and then

I’ll long to live these milky days again.

Katherine Hoerth is the author of five poetry collections. Her work has appeared in Literary Imagination (Oxford University Press), Valparaiso Review, and Southwestern American Literature. She is an associate professor at Lamar University and director of Lamar University Press. Her book, Pandora’s Prairie, is forthcoming from Cornerstone Press in 2025. 

Mortal and Immortal

Chris Ellery

May 26, 2024

“Paradise lies at the feet of your mother.”

a saying adapted from Hadith of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh)

On Mother’s Day, I visit her grave at the foot

of mother mountain. Letters on her stone

spell “GOD IS LOVE.” Birds are singing,

fish leaping and splashing in Buffalo Creek.

For mammals like me, a mother’s womb 

is the door of mortality. A creature

doomed to perish incubates in the dark

uterus, evolving through watery stages.

With luck, an eager love already feeds 

the unborn thing. With luck, a sweet voice 

sings into the body, where fate

is already counting down the days.

The water breaks. Pain and pushing and blood 

and soon you are here. Mother, standing 

in this green day remembering your song 

seems worth all the dying.

Chris Ellery is a retired teacher and lives in San Angelo. His most recent collection of poems is Canticles of the Body, which superimposes the Christian liturgical calendar with the Vedic anatomy of Kundalini Yoga.

Generations

Gary S. Rosin

May 19, 2024

old photograph
forever seventeen
Mother smiling...

now only ashes
only memories—

remind the children

Gary S. Rosin’s work has appeared in Chaos Dive Reunion (Mutabilis Press 2023), MacQueen’s Quinterly, Texas Poetry Calendar, and elsewhere. He has two chapbooks, Standing Inside the Web (Bear House Publishing), and Fire and Shadows (Legal Studies Forum).

Mother Taught Me Music

Thomas Hemminger

May 19, 2024

Before I was even born, 

Mother taught me music. 

The first sound my ears perceived

was the beat of her loving heart. 

I heard her gentle alto voice 

singing from time to time.

I kicked to the records she listened to

around the small, eastside house where we lived. 

I perceived that sound and silence were different, 

but that they were both equally important. 

Before I was even born, 

Mother taught me music. 

Thomas Hemminger is an elementary music teacher living in Dallas, Texas. His work has been published locally in Dallas, as well as in The Wilda Morris Poetry Challenge, The Texas Poetry Assignment, and The Poetry Catalog where he recently earned first place in the spring 2024 poetry contest. His personal hero is Mr. Fred Rogers, the creator of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. It was through America’s favorite “neighbor” that Thomas learned of the importance of loving others, and of giving them their own space and grace to grow.

Minor Regrets

Milton Jordan

May 12, 2024

An actively practical woman

Mother insisted she’d inherited

her style from her mother, but we soon 

noticed Grandmother’s rebel spark

of impractical activity,

afternoons spent phoning a few old friends,

and her sudden supper decisions 

to call Prince’s for hamburgers,

though much later yet, Mother explained,

with some minor regret, her obsession

for proper order, an over reaction

to her mother’s seeming disarray.

Milton Jordan lives with Anne in Georgetown, Texas. He co-edited the first Texas Poetry Assignment anthology, Lone Star Poetry, Kallisto Gaia Press, 2022.

The blind man learned to drive near Bear Creek Park

Herman Sutter

May 12, 2024

late at night

on his mother’s lap

(only ten years old).

Holding the wheel,

feeling it tremble as she let go,

he sensed the car 

understood

something he never would.

It was always the same 

road. Always the 

same hum of the asphalt 

rolling away. And always 

the sigh of the gin 

as she laughed and the sound

of the window rolling down

and the smell of the wet

as they approached the reservoir, 

and the sadness of her

remembering: That’s where 

your father used to take me when...

And then the laugh.

And always the quiet

afterward filled with the wet

and the gin and the sound

of the wind whispering: Keep 

your eye on the road, mister,

even if you can’t see.

Herman Sutter (award-winning poet/essayist) is the author of Stations (Wiseblood Books), and The World Before Grace (Wings Press), and “The Sorrowful Mystery of Racism,” St. Anthony Messenger. His work appears in The Perch (Yale University), The Langdon Review, Benedict XVI Institute, Touchstone, i.e., The Merton Journal, as well as Texas Poetry Calendar (2021) & By the Light of a Neon Moon (Madville Press, 2019). He received the 2021 Best Essay award from the CMA. His recent manuscript A Theology of Need was long-listed for the Sexton Prize.

multiples of seven

d. ellis phelps

May 12, 2024

“…it is better to be whole than to be good…”

—John Middleton Murry

mother

will you 

meet me

on the       other 

side

will you 

leave       your 

resting head 

head on over

to the pearly gates

when it is time

      ~

when it is time

will you 

break      the veil

of understanding

like eve      (formidable 

woman)       mother

lover

wife

one of us

will you meet me

      ~

will you meet me

under the tree

knowing (what

we know) and

going anyway

i hope 

i never 

have to see

him      again

you said

speaking of

karma

      ~

you left 

      your body

&

me      wondering

still       whether

(or not)

love is

eternal

      ~

i haven’t      been

good      

(neither were you

      completely)

lord have mercy

christ have mercy

we tried

i am trying

still      to keep

(impossible

      commandments)

promises

to forgive     

in multiples

of seven

      ~

you and your

surrender

having gone

before me

—stained

      as i am

mother

will you

meet me

on the      other

side

d. ellis phelps’ work has appeared widely online and in print. She is the author of four poetry collections and one novel and the editor of Moon Shadow Sanctuary Press (MSSP) and of the digital journal fws:  international journal of literature & art where she publishes the work of others

Garden Earth

Skeeter Smith

May 12, 2024

I love when my garden

Blooms and blooms,

Roses all bundled,

Nestled in their petals.

Seeds of various

Fruit and flower,

Emerging from soil

Planted with hope.

My babies are sprouting,

Sprinkle with water,

Each day a new seedling

Sprouts a new flower.

My gardenia

White blooms, pungent

Fills the air.

Sweet peas trailing

Wafting in the breeze,

Smell them as they blossom,

Down the street.

Chocolate mint trails wild,

Varieties in the mix

Fresh herbs for cooking

Rosemary for homemade bread.

Tomatoes

Eat off the vine,

Strawberries so luscious,

Raspberries taste divine.

Cannot pick them fast enough,

Eating in the garden,

Earth to mouth

Not forgotten.

Solace in my garden

God’s nature reserve

Keeps me grounded,

Part of the earth.

Skeeter Smith works in the finance industry with numbers, spreadsheets, and treasury rates. She is a graduate of Arizona State University with a Bachelor’s degree in History and a Master’s degree in Business Management. She is the mother of one and grandmother of three. The most important work in her life will always be within the four walls of her home.

What I Kept

Kathryn Jones

May 12, 2024

The curse of the eldest daughter:

I open drawers and closets,

dig through the belongings of a woman

who did not throw much away;

she wanted me to decide what to keep,

what to donate, what to toss in the trash.  

I open boxes on shelves and wonder –

how did she wear those pointed red high heels?

Why did she keep all those skirts and dresses

that no longer fit? How many purses,

scarves, belts did she really need? 

I toss them in a stack for Goodwill. 

Then I open a drawer and discover 

my childhood – grade school pictures,

a notebook about Greek mythology,

colored pencil drawings of every state flag,

a white purse with a decoupage flower

I made for her one Mother’s Day.

I open another drawer and find 

every postcard I ever sent her,

from the bottom of the Grand Canyon 

to the top of the Eiffel Tower.

When she could not leave the house, 

she at least could travel in her mind. 

I toss them all into a large plastic box, now

brimming with photos, books, handwritten letters 

I cannot throw away. I cart it all home, 

no longer feel cursed but grateful that 

she chose me, her eldest daughter, to be 

the hoarder of love, the keeper of memory. 

Kathryn Jones is a poet, journalist, and essayist whose work has been published in The New York Times, Texas Monthly, Texas Highways, and the Texas Observer. Her poetry has appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies, including TexasPoetryAssignment.com, Unknotting the Line: The Poetry in Prose (Dos Gatos Press, 2023), Lone Star Poetry (Kallisto Gaia Press, 2023), and in her chapbook, An Orchid’s Guide to Life, published by Finishing Line Press. She was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters in 2016 and lives on a ranch near Glen Rose, Texas.