Rejoice

On a tender morning in May

we bathed her in beauty and watched

as she faded into the bed.

She would have been 79.

Rejoice anyway.

She loved her birthday, she loved anyone’s birthday.

She especially loved having a birthday so close to her grandson’s,

and we often celebrated them together.

Three generations we liked to say, cameras flashing.

But not this year.

She spoke in knots toward the end,

knots that never untied,

and sentences that chased after one another.

“Boots” became “fish” and we just

nodded our heads.

We still wonder.

Her voice was too loud sometimes,

Too shrill.

It was never her voice before.

Some days the woman she had become

was not a woman she would have liked.

Then the fog enveloped her and

I became her mother.

I didn’t feel sad.

I felt strong.

Maybe I could make her.

Maybe I could make her happy.

She would have loved yesterday and all the joy.

The dancing in the streets.

New blood.

The victory speech of a woman.

She would have cried with me.

Then the rainbow,

as the sky rejoiced, too.

Oh how I wished I could have called and told her about it.

Then I realized, she knew.

She is the rainbow.