Becoming My Mother by Emily Bernhardt (ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER Series)

Becoming My Mother
by Emily Bernhardt

Broaden across collar bone. Soften shoulders down. Parallel chin to earth. Gaze forward and inward. Mouth determined. Step deliberately. Nod to traffic officer. A slight bobble from the blue trailing roller bag. Fingers wrapped securely around the handles of a bronze mesh bag.

She is French in France. She steps lightly along la rue de la la, shops for framboise. Like any happy birthday girl, she twirls, smiles to music on the longest day of the year, celebrates with a laugh and champagne for breakfast. Hazel eyes squint at the morning sun.

Wonderful, she remarks to me. Grateful for curbside check-in. Older than her Paris days. The New Yorker in the carry-on.

That old brown bag and two coins to cover her eyes. An undertaker settles her into the compartment. A great expedition.

Now. Reunion to the North American eclipse. I disembark from the shuttle. Rollers and laptop in tow. A shadow of familiar. The walk to the gate seems far. Postural adjustment. Proceed with caution.

moment of totality
from the arms of a tree
an owl confused

PAINTING: Owl under crescent moon by Ohara Koson (1915).

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: I have been exploring the Haibun form—prose with a tangent haiku. This poem was inspired by a recent trip to view the eclipse at my childhood home, and now brought to new life by my nephew and his growing family. As I traveled to Buffalo, New York, from California, I found myself making the same postural adjustment I once observed in my mother—at that time when perhaps the bags were a bit too heavy and the journey a bit too arduous. The owl haiku is true!

PHOTO: The author (right) and her mother marking her mother’s 90th birthday (Orleans, Massachusetts, 2018).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Emily Bernhardt is retired from numbers and Los Angeles. She lives on the central coast of California and writes occasional poetry, celebrating family, friends, and the natural world.