Poetry for Caregivers
I began writing poetry in elementary school and it continues to be an outlet that allows me to express my greatest fears, questions, and joys. I have used poetry as a release during my caregiving seasons and as a reflective way of looking back on a season after it passed. I will be offering a few of my poems in this section in hopes that you can identify with some of the trials and successes I have faced.
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This first poem reminds me that caregiving is often a two-way exchange. We both give and receive.
ROSAURA
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I called you hermana, yet you were like a mother,
my Nicaraguan mamasita.
You fixed Guatemalan carne with too much grease,
and I loved your food, even when the fat
lay heavy in my stomach and I spent the day in bed.
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You knocked on my door with two teenagers and
a quest for shelter. Could I refuse a pilgrim mother?
Yet it was hard selling the idea of guests to a husband
who saw only the tiny frame of a home
and felt the weight of open mouths.
You stayed because I could not abandon
anyone's mother to the streets.
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Our first Central American houseguest . . . and you still
stayed even when your son had arrived safely
in Florida and all of the relatives were calling you
to get on the bus. You wanted to take care of me
and clean my house and cook and wait up nights
when I had been visiting your people.
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We clung to each other's dresses, washing them
without soap the day you left to help your daughter
with the new grandbaby. You were welcomed in Florida,
but in Texas the house was empty, the floor unmopped,
the kitchen without the savor of carne:
I was left alone to be the mother of the people and of
myself.
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Terri Vaughn
published in NOW AND THEN. ©2008
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