Our Losses Return to Us by Bill Ratner (ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER Series)

Our Losses Return to Us
by Bill Ratner

Long after other dreams
my mother comes back

like an ancient celebrity in a hotel
with an appointment secretary

Before you see her you need to know
she is in a very fragile state, says the man

I am no longer trusted
walled off by protocol

her papery skin, dry viscera
decades under the sod at Saint James Kingsessing

I need to tell her
how hard it was to do without her

Perhaps I am being unfair
a bit too needful

Promptly the dream slides away
like lamb from a meat slicer

PAINTING: Mother and Child by Pablo Picasso (1922).

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: My mother died of breast cancer when I was seven years old, so as I live my life and write my poems she occasionally appears in dreams, and I include her in the occasional poem. Hopefully I write about her, not in a maudlin, helpless manner, but lyrical and evocative, honoring her memory.

PHOTO: The author with his mother Dolly during a visit to Spider Lake, Wisconsin (Summer, 1952).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Bill Ratner is one of Los Angeles’ best known voice actors and author of the poetry collection Fear of Fish (Alien Buddha Press), the poetry chapbook To Decorate a Casket (Finishing Line Press,) and a Best of the Net Poetry Nominee (Lascaux Review). His writing has appeared in Best Small Fictions 2021 (Sonder Press,) Missouri Review (audio), Baltimore Review, Chiron Review, Feminine Collective, and other journals. A nine-time winner of the Moth StorySLAM, a certified grief counselor, and an officer in his union SAG-AFTRA, he teaches Voiceovers for SAG-AFTRA Foundation and Media Awareness for Los Angeles Unified School District. Find him at billratner.com and at Soundcloud, YouTube, Instagram and X (Twitter).