For Mothers Day, the family is obliged to go on an outing of my choosing, and this year it was the beautiful gardens of Dumbarton Oaks, all dressed up in their spring finery. Here my husband and daughter find an unusual rest stop above the cutting garden west of the Prunus Walk.
And also for Mothers Day, a poem by George Bilgere, “Laundry,” of which I did none today.
My mother stands in this black
And white arrangement of shadows
In the sunny backyard of her marriage,
Struggling to pin the white ghosts
Of her family on the line.
I watch from my blanket on the grass
As my mother’s blouses lift and billow,
Bursting with the day.
My father’s white work shirts
Wave their empty sleeves at me,
And my own little shirts and pants
Flap and exult like flags
In the immaculate light.
It is mid-century, and the future lies
Just beyond the white borders
Of this snapshot; soon that wind
Will get the better of her
And her marriage. Soon the future
I live in will break
Through those borders and make
A photograph of her-but
For now the shirts and blouses
Are joyous with her in the yard
As she stands with a wooden clothespin
In her mouth, struggling to keep
The bed sheets from blowing away.
—George Bilgere
Martha
