We
each wanted our own story
We each wanted our own story,
my mother and I;
we were talkers, her first then me,
each wanted the other to listen until her heart broke.
It didn't matter where the story began,
or what it was about, each had a better one,
each had gone out farther, seen more,
each needed this time to be listened to;
each was ready to kill the other to get her to shut up.
Or so it seemed
to me
until I hated her. She had the advantage,
years when I didn't exist; she knew war, marriage,
the birth of sons, decline; I knew dreams, agility,
desire, a girl's demands. It was no wonder I got out of there,
no wonder I ran for my life.
Everywhere
I went, fatherless daughters
yapped like maniacs. And every time an older woman stopped me
to pour out her heart, I understood why she did this.
And the whispers in the theaters,
and the soft patter after lovemaking,
and the homeless woman explaining herself to a building
--I understood. A girl can't make her mother listen,
and she can't make her mother stop talking.
Even years later, when I returned,
my mother wouldn't let me get a word in,
she had so much to say about how well she's been.
copyright CW Begay 2000
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