Mother

Mother

Mother is my first friend

My first love

My first guide

My first lady

She, who held my hand

To cross the street

Who made each meal,

every bedtime,

A gentle treat.

Mother

Is my frail soul now,

Trying to guide two sons,

To the right path,

The living brilliance,

Breathing radiance

That is life,

If lived truly

From the heart.

Mother is frail and

Her soul needs mine,

To sustain her strength

To live, to abide,

With pain and misery

That age and sickness brings.

I am sickened to my heart

That the relief she seeks,

The Gods with who she fervently pleads

Do not listen, hear, or heed. 

When she prostrates her head

To each deity, every idol, 

All the divine pictures mounted 

on the walls of her homestead.

I must be strong though tears come,

It was mother…

Who named me “Amrita.”

The indestructible one.

Ma, I bow my soul to be the arrow

On your heart string.

May God use me my mother, 

To alleviate your suffering.

© Amrita Valan 2017