Poems for Moms

So I was fascinated with this image of Valerie's mom receiving a shipment of ladybugs every summer for her garden. And this poem arrived because of it. The character in the poem is not necessarily Valerie's mother. More of a fictional construct to work with the feel and tone of the poem. Though I did change one thing in there that Valerie said is very much not her mother or at least seemed a little too 'poemy'. Or maybe that was my word. My only regret is that the spacing I have in the poem won't show up here.

Delivery

Where Rosie walks, Rosie gardens.
She cares as a sheltering statue, she makes no rations.
Rosie -- the sun calm behind clouds,
knees down in the dirt, her grown kids inside congregate,
there is a bulb of homesickness with them.
Rosie recites to her granddaughter --Rhododendron, Hibiscus
she says back, Rhododo, Hibkibus,
there is nothing wrong in this or anything.
She doesn’t correct, she has corrected enough to get them here
set them all up like a first bike.

When Rosie was full with Valerie,
she would situate a stethoscope to eavesdrop,
never finding a heartbeat but an ocean
that a little girl was swimming across to get to her.
Much later, beneath her tended growth, while she weeds,
Rosie’s girl laps the garden shadowed pool,
always turning around when she is done going away.

And once a summer, Rosie receives a shipment of ladybugs.
A mailman comes right to her door with a package,
Rosie taking it, feeling the gentling bumps,
hearing the whir of bitty wings.
This is a sacred summer ritual, the procession
of box, held crown like, in Rosie’s clutch,
through the glass door, around deck chairs and pool toys,
to the garden, to lift open the lid and release,
like a genie wish, an illusion willed,
this slow firework, a sun’s spent fuels.

Then she palms the ones left, that didn’t make the journey,
cups the earth and spills these quiet rubies,
to plant even those.